


I Will Be Your Remedy

by rarities



Category: SKAM (France)
Genre: (i think), Alternate Universe, Angst, Bipolar Disorder, But his mom is an angel, Hurt/Comfort, Idk how to tag yet, Internalized Homophobia, Lucas's dad is a dick, M/M, Mental Illness, Slow Burn, a lot of self deprecation, lucas is a bit of a hot mess, polaris was continued
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-28
Updated: 2019-05-28
Packaged: 2020-02-08 19:19:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 23,813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18629635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rarities/pseuds/rarities
Summary: So Lucas let himself like other people’s comments, and he checked every day for an update that would probably never come, because the fact that there had never been an official cancellation notice was really the only thing keeping him hopeful, keeping him going, making everyday worth getting out of bed for.Well, that and the cute boy on the bus.





	1. I Want More Out of Life Than This

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! :) Work title comes from Remedy by Adele, chapter title from San Marcos by Brockhampton. This is my first fic on AO3 and I'm hoping everything uploads properly, haha. 
> 
> Sorry, I'm about to ramble a bit here.
> 
> I'd like to mention that this is a universe that takes place during the same time as Season 3, and Eliott isn't in school anymore (I think he was repeating a year? Or maybe I'm getting him confused with Even, I'm sorry! This is just me complicating things and it won't be this complicated when you're reading, I swear), and he continued Polaris, and this fic features my interpretation of that as well as other short films he makes. It is also a universe where Lucas is struggling, and obsessing a bit over some stuff, and one I am really excited to explore. 
> 
> (Also, I know there was a code set to figure out Eliott's personal account from the Polaris page, but I'm just going to pretend that hasn't happened to keep some mystery here.)(Also, please bear with me, because I am American and definitely going to get so many things wrong about France.)
> 
> Thank you for reading! xoxoxo

**Jeudi 06:20**

Mika was the most annoying human alarm clock to ever exist.

This was the second thought to occur to Lucas when he woke up. The first was,  _ What the fuck just jumped on my legs? _

“Rise and shine, Lucas! School waits for no one!” said Manon from across the living room. She was wearing pajama pants and holding a cup of something steaming, probably coffee. She had come back from London a few days before, but last night was the first that Lucas had had to hand her room back over and settle to bed on the couch. 

He had half expected Manon to refuse the bedroom, which was a bit naive, but still. It was Lucas’s room now. He had been paying rent on it, albeit lately. It wasn’t even the room she had originally occupied! But Mika and his “Flatshare is a way of mind, Lucas” had to get in the way of it, and Lucas, who still felt like he didn’t have much stake in the matter, could not exactly protest.

“Well, it waits for Manon, and for everyone else that doesn’t need extra help, so basically school waits for everyone but you.”

“Get off me, Mika. Why are you two awake right now? What’s with all the energy? What time is it?” Lucas squeezed his eyes shut and tried to pull his blanket up over his head. Mika, who did not get off, pulled on the blanket and leaned in closer to Lucas’ face.

“Do you always ask this many questions in the morning?” 

“Must you evade them?”

“Oh, morning Lucas is mean,” Mika exclaimed, looking back at where Manon stood.

“It’s twenty past six,” she offered. Lucas groaned.

“I missed my alarm?” He rubbed the sleep out of his eyes. He had to be at school early, and had been going early for three weeks now. 

His science teacher, concerned about his slipping grades, had called him in one day for a conference. She had seemed to care, and genuinely wanted to know if anything was going on and if she could help. But Lucas couldn’t very well tell her-- or anyone, in fact -- what was going on with his parents and everything else, so she had no choice but to assign him a tutor. Imane, of course. The best in the class.

Imane had only been available before school, for whatever reason, and despite his attempts to shrug off the tutoring and keep pushing on, his test scores could not lie. And so he had been meeting her at seven every morning in the common room to discuss cells and evolution and one thousand other things that made his head spin.

“Yes, you did, but luckily for you, you have two loving roommates who were ripped out of their sleep, their bodies in a state that can only be described as physically  _ shocked  _ at not hearing the sound of you slipping in the shower--”

“That was one time,” Lucas interjected.

“--and came immediately to awaken you and ensure that you will make your help sessions! It is of course of the utmost importance that you succeed in school, or you will fail out and then be banished from the flatshare, as we cannot tolerate any underachieving energy here, okay?”

From his spot on the couch, his back and neck aching from twisting and turning upon the cushions all night long, Lucas sort of felt like he had already been banished. But he didn’t say that. Instead, he said: “Where do you get this energy from this early?”

“Don’t be silly. You know my energy is limitless, Lucas. And for Manon, well, she is well-rested now that she has a bed again.”

“I’m so happy for her,” Lucas replied.

“You really are rude this morning. Did you not sleep well here on our beautiful couch?”

“Mika,” Manon chided playfully.

“Oh, no, I know! It’s because you were up late watching those sad videos again weren’t you?”

“Mika, leave him alone.” 

“Fine, fine. If anyone needs me I will be sleeping in today. Last night was very eventful,” he said, finally pushing up off of Lucas and shifting his eyebrows suggestively as he backed out of the room.

“We heard,” Lucas deadpanned.

“Cheer up, Lucas! It’s a beautiful day!” He disappeared into his bedroom, where Lucas assumed one of Mika’s recent hookups was still asleep. His eyes drifted to the clock on the wall and found the time again. He groaned.  _ Everyone  _ should still be asleep at this hour.

Manon set down the cup of coffee in front of Lucas and offered him a small smile. “We’re still on for lunch in the common room with the girls, right?” 

“Yeah,” he said giving her a smile back. It sucked that she had his room now, but she was a calming presence to have around. She didn’t succumb to Mika’s craziness or Lisa’s moodiness. It was quite nice to have her there. Even if the sight of her, looking perfect and energetic when he would barely have the time this morning to brush his hair, made Lucas grit his teeth a bit.

* * *

**Jeudi 06:45**

The bus arrived right when Lucas did. He breathed a sigh of relief. He didn’t want to keep Imane waiting, especially because he feared his grades were completely in her hands, but there was another benefit to the 6:45 bus that could not be forgotten. In fact, he never forgot it. It loomed in the back of his mind all day.

Lucas stepped on to the bus, taking his usual spot standing up near the front. The bus was one of those where the seats all faced each other, but Lucas didn’t really like to sit in such a close proximity to strangers, so he stood instead. From his spot he could see everyone, and so he briefly scanned the faces around him. It seemed to be the regular crowd. His eyes surveyed the people, looking past the bored adults headed to their jobs, and the still-drunk university students with dazed looks and smudged makeup, until…

He saw him. 

He was always doing something different, the boy on the bus. Sometimes he was reading a book. Sometimes he was sketching on a piece of paper. Sometimes he had his body turned towards the window, head pressed against the glass, gazing outside as the bus weaved through the streets of Paris.

Lucas felt a little bit like a stalker watching him do these things, even three weeks in.  _ Especially  _ three weeks in.

But every morning, he’d get on the bus to find the boy already there, in the back corner, and once his heart slowed back down to its normal pace, the brief time spent watching him would make Lucas’s whole day better. It made getting up this early worth it. 

For that short bus ride, every morning, Lucas could forget.

He could push aside thoughts of school, family, the rent he was behind on, and that pretty big secret he was keeping from his friends. For those few minutes-- nine minutes if they didn’t hit any stop lights, thirteen if they hit them all (not like Lucas was counting) --he could ignore every little responsibility eating at him. 

He could also ignore everyone else on the bus. These people were hazy to him; they were always the same tired face in different people, the same sad eyes on different faces. Was he one of these people, too? Sometimes he thought this was the only reason he looked for the boy. He looked so different from everyone else, some star shining more brightly than the others against the night. 

Today, the boy had his hoodie up and headphones covering his ears, a tiny smile on his face as he slowly nodded his head to whatever he was listening to. Lucas tried to ignore the pounding of his heart and focused instead on steadying his breath.

They were the best nine-to-thirteen minutes of his weekdays, but they also were the ones when his body and emotions were most turbulent.

The bus ride went fast today, sadly, just ten minutes allotted for the reverie that would keep Lucas afloat the next 24 hours. The bus screeched to a halt at the bus stop near school, and Lucas forced himself to look away from the boy, still nodding along to the music. 

The boy never saw him, of course, a fact Lucas lamented every time he stepped off and walked away from the bus. But if he had, Lucas wouldn’t have known what to do, and so it was best for Lucas to pine from a distance. After all, with everything else going on, he had no time to spend stressing over the cute boy from the bus any more than he already did. And anyway, that boy was a star. Lucas would always be under clouds of grey.

* * *

**Jeudi 11:52**

When Lucas walked into the common room, he found exactly what he had expected to see: five eager girls, talking wildly and awaiting his arrival for lunch, just as they had every other day this week.

He had been spending more and more time with the girls since Manon came back from London and they came around the flat more. He was surprised at how easily he fit into their dynamic, a detail that both eased and scared him. He was quickly becoming as comfortable, or even more so, than he was around his own friends, whom he had been distancing himself from.

It was just getting harder to keep so many secrets from so many people, and he couldn’t even look Yann in the eyes anymore without feeling his tremendous guilt at not telling him the truth about everything. It was easier with the girls for so many reasons. 

The first was that he was pretty sure Manon knew about the whole gay thing, even if she mercifully never said anything, because he knew Mika told her pretty much everything, including where the two of them had met.

Second, he had known most of them for a much shorter time, and it was always easier to evade suspicions of people who didn’t know you as well. Yann would have seen through any of his half-assed excuses in a second, but the girls didn’t. And if ever they were a bit doubtful, they didn’t have a place yet to say anything.

Third, they often, usually, always, had other things than him on their minds.

“I’m telling the truth! It really was that big,” exclaimed Emma, speaking while chewing food in her mouth and waving her fork through the air.

“Woah,” Lucas said, putting his hands up in mock surprise. “What conversation did I just walk into?” He pulled out the chair next to Daphne, who was taking tiny bites of a salad. He fought back a frown and looked at his own paper bag in hand, stuffed with candy bars and chips he had bought from the vending machine this morning. He’d much rather eat junk food than what looked like nothing more than a bunch of lettuce.

“Don’t worry, that conversation is finished,” Daphne said, sending a pointed look back and forth between Emma and Alexia. “In fact, Lucas, there’s something I absolutely have to talk to you about.”

“Okay,” he said as he unwrapped a candy bar. “What?”

“That.” She pointed her finger, and six pairs of eyes focused on the wall.

“The ugly mural?” Alexia asked. “There’s been complaints about that shit since the beginning of the common room, three whole months ago.” Lucas had to agree. It really was ugly.

“What does it have to do with Lucas?” Manon asked.

“Well, I was wondering if he could paint it,” Daphne said, with a solid voice of confidence quite unfitting for a person asking another of a demand so out of the blue.

“Me? Why?” Lucas looked up at the mural with a grimace. He really didn’t have the time or the energy to deal with it. And he wasn’t even an artist. A five year old could finger-paint a piece of paper better than what he could do if tasked with fixing the mural.

“Well, first of all, no one wants to lug the ladder around to reach the far edges,” Daphne responded, pointing vaguely at the top of the room. Lucas craned his neck, feeling the wall with the mural grow in front of him and feeling himself shrink before it. “It would be much better to have a boy do it, and as you’ve helped us bring couches in and everything, it only makes sense. You’ve put almost as much work into this place as I have!”

Lucas didn’t think that was true, exactly, but he could sense now what Daphne was doing. He was about to cut her off, to refuse and tell her that it would look even worse if he had to paint it, when she gave her second point of reasoning.

“Second of all, you’re an artist!” She said happily, and turned to face the other girls all at once. “He mentioned it the other day in the hall.”

Lucas felt his face fall. Manon and Imane both looked at him questioningly. 

It had been two days ago, when he was speaking to Daphne in the hallway and had seen Yann coming straight towards him. He rushed to leave, but Daphne asked him where he was going. Lucas spotted a picture of a paintbrush on the door of an art classroom and hastily made the excuse he had a painting lesson before darting away.

Now, he felt like an idiot. He had escaped a line of questioning from Yann, probably about the dozens of unanswered messages he had been sent, but had inadvertently dug himself deeper into the lies. This was the problem with lying to everyone, he knew. And this hole that he had climbed into was getting deeper and wider, until the way out was seemingly nonexistent. He couldn’t very well take it back now, could he?

“Er,” was all he managed to get out.

“Wow, Lucas!” said Emma, who had known him the longest and should have known he was no artist. “I really had no idea.” She didn’t seem suspicious in the slightest.

“Me neither,” said Manon, a bit curiously. He tried not to meet her eyes.

“Well he is, and I’m sure he’s terrific. There’s no one better for the job,” Daphne squealed and clapped her hands together. He could tell, instantly, that this was the end of the conversation about this, and that he was soon going to spend a fair amount of time painting over what now felt like the biggest wall in France. 

He looked at Daphne for a fleeting moment. She was much more confident and clever than she looked, a fact that was becoming very clear the more time he spent with her.

“Oh, Emma, did I tell you what Alex said?” said Alexia, and suddenly the girls were launched into a whole new conversation, leaving Lucas behind, still staring at the mural.

* * *

**Jeudi 17:12**

Lucas unlocked the door and stepped inside, pleased to realize that no one was home. Well, Lisa was probably home. But she didn’t really count.

Passing (quite remorsefully) past his old room, he stepped into the living room and flopped onto the couch. Or his bed. Whatever it was.

He unlocked his phone to find a text he did not want to answer.

**Yann: Hey man can we talk? Please respond this time**

Lucas sighed and thought back to the mural incident. Daphne had found him after class to tell him she had met with the principal and blocked out a free time for him to paint it, a week from this Saturday, when everyone else would be enjoying their weekend. When Lucas thought of this, and the hours he was to spend amateurly painting over the wall, he felt the web of lies growing at his feet, reaching up his legs and wrapping its netting around him.

**Lucas: Yeah. Lunch tomorrow with the boys?**

**Yann: Yeah, man. See you there**

Lucas closed the message and put the thought out of his mind. It would be a difficult conversation to be had with his friends, but that was tomorrow. He still had today to focus on, and before he could do his homework, before he could do anything at all, there was something he had to check on.

He opened the internet on his phone and clicked on a bookmark he had, a page he visited every day, mostly out of a desperate necessity.

It was a link to a Youtube page with a collection of videos. It had been a project started by a student from another school the year before, the first ever video, Polaris, being an animated film about two people-- well, one was more specifically a  _ creature  _ \--meeting at opposite sides of the edge of a tunnel, one standing in the light, one standing in the dark, and the two of them falling in love. 

It was only a few minutes long, but every frame had etched itself onto Lucas’s heart. He had probably seen that first video a thousand times.

There were more videos, too. The original creator had not given up on this project, even after they would have finished school. They made twelve more stories, all dealing with similar themes of loneliness and fear and love, wrapped profoundly in these wordless clips. 

One video had been about a man and a woman meeting at the top of a bridge, both there to jump off and leave the world for good. They instead spent the night talking to each other, and each goes home filled with hope. The next night, the girl goes back to the spot to find that the man has jumped off a few moments before her arrival. She then jumps, too.

When Lucas first watched that, he cried for days.

The creator never inserted dialogue into the videos, only animated drawings that shifted fluidly from scene to scene. They weren’t complicated figures, but they were able to express emotions so powerfully that Lucas came away from a video feeling more moved by them than anything; there was no book, movie, or song that could make him experience so many strong feelings.

Lucas was a bit obsessed with the videos. He desperately wanted more.

But the project had been dropped, abruptly, when the creator had been half-way through a four-part series, each just fifteen minutes long. The first episode had focused on a girl at a school, seemingly in Norway, and the second episode had focused on one of her friends. The videos didn’t get to explicitly express much, as the creator’s style was usually focused in hazy, dark shapes. The episodes were more about how the girls were feeling, pressured by their peers and by society, and how they coped with this pressure in different ways. It was truly remarkable.

But the second episode had been uploaded six months ago, and there had been radio silence ever since. 

The channel name was just a bunch of letters, and though Lucas typed them into every search bar across every platform, he could not find the creator anywhere. There were a few hundred comments on each video, every one theorizing about the author and where he or she could have went, and begging for more content. Lucas had never been brave enough to comment on his own, because there was so much he wanted to say:

_ Hello, your stories deeply impacted my life.  _

_ Hi, this was amazing and it changed the way I think about everything. _

_ Hey, your videos hit me hard right in the heart and make me feel nothing like I’ve ever felt have before, and I’m afraid that a big part of my staying alive relies on updates, here, as soon as possible. Like, please take your time and no rush, but, like, as soon as possible, please, and also thank you, for so much, for everything. _

So he let himself like other people’s comments, and he checked every day for an update that would probably never come, because the fact that there had never been an official cancellation notice was really the only thing keeping him hopeful, keeping him going, making everyday worth getting out of bed. 

Well, that and the cute boy on the bus.


	2. This is the First Day of my Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It took a moment to find him today. He was in his normal seat, of course, but this time something was different. Lucas was looking for the top of his head, expecting the boy to be bent down over something, or for closed eyes, and to see him listening to music. He hadn’t expected to see piercing blue eyes looking at him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! It's been two weeks, but they've been the busiest weeks of my life so I hope you'll forgive me. This chapter is 5300 words, and I had so much fun writing it once I stopped worrying about uploading and made it the best it could be. I have a lot of plans for this fic so I hope you'll bear with me and I hope you'll enjoy this chapter! Chapter titles comes from "First Day of My Life" by Bright Eyes ;).

**Vendredi 06:12**

Lucas woke up with heavy eyes.

He hadn’t been able to fall asleep until it was almost dawn and there were birds _-god_ how he had begun to hate birds- chirping outside his window. By the time he woke up, it felt as if he hadn’t gotten any rest at all, something that was becoming his new normal. There were a thousand things running through his mind, bouncing off the walls of his skull and keeping him awake better than caffeine ever had. It was despressingly tiring, and Lucas had begun to move through his days in a sluggish pace. How terrible it was to need sleep so desperately and never be able to become rested.

Still, somehow he pulled himself off the couch and into the shower and shamelessly used up all the hot water that was left. After only a few minutes, the hot water turned cold, so he got out and got dried and got dressed in mere seconds, and then he skipped breakfast once again and still he stumbled out the door five minutes later than he should’ve. It seemed time would not move as slowly as he preferred. It was racing all around him, and he couldn’t catch up.

The walk to the bus stop wasn’t very long, but it usually took Lucas the whole three minutes to get himself awake and alert. Today, the cold wind hit him the moment he was outside. It whipped around him mercilessly as it blew through his hair. The sky was dark and cloudy, and Lucas couldn’t help but feel the weather was matching his mood.

Shivering, he looked down with bleary eyes at his chosen outfit. Jeans and a t-shirt were all he had found to wear this morning, certainly not the warmest of outfits. But it was already too late to go back, and he was pretty sure these were the only clean clothes he had anyway. So with his lips chapping and fingers stiffening, Lucas ran to the bus stop, getting there right when the bus was about to pull away.

“Wait!” he called out to the driver. “Wait for me!”

Begrudgingly, the driver stopped pulling away from the curb and opened the doors back up. Lucas hastily jumped in and shoved his fare at the man before scrambling to join the other passengers. He didn’t even wait for change, despite the fact he really needed it. (Every cent wasted counted against another necessity he’d have to wager -which would he have to forgo this week? Rent? Food? Lucas was getting tired of scrounging together his last coins for a meal, but he was too proud to ask anyone for money. Especially not his father.)

There was nowhere to sit so he had to stand right in the middle of the aisle and grasp the handlebars. He was too frazzled for those first few moments to take account of his surroundings. He just focused his energy on holding onto the handlebars as the bus pulled away. He had a feeling this bus driver wasn’t feeling particularly graceful today, and the last thing he needed was to go flying down the middle of the bus.

Once he stopped freezing, Lucas shook himself out of his daze and looked around. It seemed like the normal crowd of tired night shift workers and stragglers. Lucas’ eyes, as they always did now, drifted towards the boy. He was always sitting in the back corner, always preoccupied with something.Lucas vaguely wondered what it would be today. Music, maybe? A book from school?

How badly Lucas had always wanted to march over there and sit next to the boy and peer over his shoulder. He wanted to take one earbud for himself and nod his head along to the music. He wanted to read whatever book he had and turn the pages together. But despite every moment Lucas had spent watching him, despite every fiber of his being telling him they knew each other, that they were familiar, there was a barrier between them. A quite normal one, really. They were strangers. Lucas’ delusions could not change that.

It took a moment to find him today. He was in his normal seat, of course, but this time something was different. Lucas was looking for the top of his head, expecting the boy to be bent down over something, or for closed eyes, and to see him listening to music. He hadn’t expected to see piercing blue eyes looking at him.

Or, well, he was looking at his shirt.

Nevertheless, it sent a chill through Lucas completely separate from the freezing temperatures outside. An icy fist grabbed at his lungs and his breathing halted. _Why is he looking at me?_

Lucas looked down. The t-shirt had been a very out-of-character gift from Mika a few months ago. His roommate had barged into his room (back when he had one), jumped on his bed, pulled away his biology book and said: “I have something for you.”

Lucas wasn’t used to receiving things out of the blue, and couldn’t help but feel that he had failed in properly accepting the gift. When he opened it, he just gave Mika a small smile and timid thank you.

But really, he was overwhelmed. It was a shirt from one of those fan-made merchandise stores like Etsy, and was designed for Polaris. He had seen the shirt before after it popped up on his Twitter feed --he shamelessly followed an account called “Polaris Express Updates,” an account that had not delivered any good news in a while-- and loved it, but he never had enough money to buy it, even though it was for a good cause; the seller said all proceeds went to mental health foundations.

The shirt was blue with a pattern of stars, the constellation Ursa Minor, and one of the stars shined brighter than the others. This one star was Polaris, and underneath the constellation there was a quote from Virginia Woolf that had been incorporated into one of the Polaris episodes:

_There was a star riding through clouds one night, and I said to the star, ‘Consume me’._

The shirt was beautiful, but what had drawn Lucas to it was that it was discreet. It was a message only a Polaris fan would understand, a small signal to the world that he knew about this thing and loved it but he didn’t have to tell everyone. He could wear the shirt in the open and it felt like he was wearing his heart on his sleeve. It was like telling a secret to only the right people. It was perfectly Lucas.

And he had shown Polaris to Mika, but never seriously, too afraid of what Mika would say if he knew it was such a big deal to Lucas (it was terrifying to expose yourself through the things you love), but Mika had somehow known. And he had found the shirt and bought it for Lucas, in a time things were hard. It was right when his mother had entered a mental health facility, and he had started to distance himself from his friends and spend more time in his room. Mika gifting it to him just solidified his position as the caring roommate who never failed to see right through him. When Lucas angrily brushed off Mika’s gentle questions about his day, Mika never pried. But he always left Lucas the last cookie, or let him pay rent extremely late, or pretty much anything else that made him the best roommate ever.It made Lucas feel shitty every single time.

But then Mika would go and do something like make him trade his room with Manon, and suddenly Lucas wouldn’t feel so indebted anymore.

Still, Mika’s ability to sense when Lucas needed to be cheered up was pretty uncanny. And sometimes, it resulted in gifts like the t-shirt.

He had wanted to ask why he would do this, what purpose it served, why he would give such an important gift to the closeted kid who leeched off him like, well, a leech. Because to Lucas, it was so much more than a shirt. It was a physical representation of the thing that was keeping him going, stringing him along from day to day. Polaris was like an undercurrent in his life. It was the thing he could think about when nothing else was good.

That and the boy on the bus, who was still looking at him.

He looked a bit confused. Or maybe surprised. Lucas couldn’t help but study the lines of his face as he watched the expression on it morph and change into a small smile. The boy smiled effortlessly, but it said so much. It made his face look light and happy and beautiful. It loosened a tightness in Lucas’ heart he hadn’t even felt before, and suddenly he was smiling too, more of a reflex than anything else, and as he smiled the world looked brighter even from the inside of a dirty Paris bus on a gloomy morning.

Lucas was still smiling when the boy looked up.

It was like a hundred different signals going off in his brain. The boy’s eyebrows jumped up a bit when he realized Lucas was looking at him (and smiling at him like a psycho), but his expression didn’t change.

Until it did, and he smiled wider, and the chill Lucas had felt was replaced by a burning warmth that terrified him and thrilled him all at once. He wanted to run away. He wanted to jump into the flames.

The world around them disappeared. The boy made a goofy face and stuck out his tongue, and Lucas flushed all over. How had he gone from so cold to so hot all at once? He was practically gasping for air.

Before Lucas could react, the boy’s face changed again. This time it was more serious, focused on looking at something past Lucas’ head. Lucas followed his gaze out the front window of the bus. They were coming on Lucas’ stop.

 _Oh_ , he thought, regretfully. _Right_ . And then: _Did he know this was my stop?_

He had forgotten, for those few seconds, about reality. He had forgotten about meeting Imane early so she could help him. He had forgotten about everything completely.

As the bus slowed to a stop, Lucas found the courage to shoot the boy a small, sad smile. Then he quickly turned around, knowing that their brief interaction would be in the forefront of his mind all day, whereas the other boy would probably forget in five minutes. He seemed so much older and more mature. He probably stuck his tongue out at strangers on the bus regularly, when it took Lucas too much energy to even say hello to the driver.

Still, Lucas couldn’t help but notice the look in his eye after he had seen the shirt Lucas was wearing. He had seemed happy. Maybe even amazed. Was he a fan of Polaris, too? Because as much as he wanted someone to talk about it with, it was a bit jarring knowing something so personal to him could be as important to other people. There were thousands on the Internet claiming it had saved their lives, but Lucas didn’t have to picture them. He could share it with them from the safety of his own home, knowing that it held something different to him than it did to any of them, and that when he watched those videos it almost felt like they were made for him. But it would be another thing entirely to face another fan in person, and see the look in their eyes when they talked about it, and recognize Lucas’ own expression on them. It wasn’t that he was stupid; he knew he wasn’t the only person in the world to enjoy Polaris. But he’d like to go on believing he was, when he could.

Regardless, it wouldn’t matter. Today was Friday, and Lucas wouldn’t see the other boy again until Monday, if he did at all. By that time, the ten seconds they spent making eye contact --to Lucas, it felt like ten years-- would be a distant memory, and he and the boy on the bus would go back to their own separate worlds.

* * *

**Vendredi 11:52**

Lucas was still jittery from his brief interaction with the boy on the bus that morning, but there were now more pressing issues to deal with. He had nearly forgotten about having lunch with the boys until Yann sent him a text an hour before to ask if he was still coming. Lucas said yes, but only because he didn’t want to spend any more time avoiding them. In reality, he didn’t feel ready to face them at all.

He saw Basile and Arthur first, and then Yann, looking expectant as he checked his watch for the time. It had been weeks since they had a real conversation. The boys were sitting at a picnic table, all of them on top of it with their feet on the benches. Lucas had seen them sitting in that exact place a thousand times before, usually waiting for him to get there and eat lunch with them, joking and shoving each other and laughing, and Lucas would join them happily.

But now things looked different, sort of solemn. Lucas felt a pain as he walked towards them. He had caused this shift in atmosphere. They probably blamed him, as they should. The only solace he had was that it would have been worse if he had stayed. He had a way of bringing down the mood lately; it was something Mika had poked fun at in the annoyingly concerned way only he could pull off. Lucas knew his friends should be more grateful than angry for the distance he put between them. Which made this whole thing worse.

He clenched his fists and grit his teeth on the walk over. Each step felt painful, made worse by the wind that had not warmed up from that morning. And Lucas had failed to find a sweatshirt, so he was still bracing the cold in his Polaris t-shirt. (He hoped no one would ask about it; it didn’t say Polaris on it, and it contained a quote only a Polaris fan would recognize, so it wasn’t entirely incriminating. But he had never told them about Polaris and he didn’t want to now.)

They all saw him at the same time. Basile and Arthur both grinned and jumped off the bench of the lunch table they were sitting on to wrap Lucas in a group hug and ruffle his hair. They made jokes about Lucas’ return, but he wasn’t paying attention. He was watching to see Yann’s reaction.

Yann, like Mika, had always been able to see right through Lucas. Or maybe it was just that Lucas was easy to read. In any case, it was nearly impossible for Lucas to keep secrets from his best friend. And so instead of telling the truth, he had avoided him, and avoided saying anything at all. He knew it had hurt Yann the most out of all of his friends when he stopped communicating and shut down, and he knew it had been even worse when he started hanging out with the girls. But it was so hard to be around someone that knew you so well when you barely even knew who you were anymore.

“Hey,” Lucas said weakly, not meeting anyone’s eyes. “Are we staying here?” He gestured vaguely to the table.

“Um, yeah, if that works for you,” Yann said. It was a normal, even respectful, thing to say, and still Lucas felt a stab of pain. He didn’t deserve for Yann or anyone else to care about what “worked for him.” There were so many things in his life he hadn’t deserved. His best friend topped the list.

“Yeah, of course.” He moved to sit down and then stopped abruptly. “If that works for you,” he added hesitantly.

“Yeah, it does. Just sit down, will you?” Yann sat on one edge of the table and Lucas sat in front of him. He was glad when Arthur sat next to him and Basile sat next to Yann; if it had been his three friends on one side and him alone on the other, it would have felt like an interrogation. Well, only more so than it already was. Lucas knew he had some explaining to do, and that it would only be fair of him to try and explain why he had been so distant when he found the nerve to come back.

Before Basile could crack a joke and make the whole thing even more drawn out and awkward, Lucas spoke. He hadn’t quite figured out what he wanted to say before he opened his mouth and let the words tumble out of it. Truth be told, he was scared of every syllable. He knew that what he had to say was serious, but maybe his friends wouldn’t believe him. Maybe Yann would sense there was more to the story, and there was, of course, but that was a truth Lucas was not ready to tell yet.

“So, I know you guys have been wondering why I’ve been distant lately. I know I haven’t been the best of friends,” Lucas said quietly. He fiddled with his thumbs as he spoke, unable to look any of his friends in the eye, fearful of a silent confirmation that would verify the words he already knew were true. He had been a bad friend. But his friends were good enough not to agree outright. “And the truth is that things have been really hard lately, and I didn’t want to be a burden on you guys.” He risked a glance up at Yann, who was wearing a serious expression. He didn’t look mad, but he didn’t look patient, either.

“You’re not a burden,” he said.

“Yeah, man,” Arthur said. “You’re really not.” Basile agreed. Lucas was still looking at Yann.

“What things?” Yann asked after a moment.

“What?” Lucas asked.

“What things have been hard lately?”

Lucas took a deep breath and blew out slowly. He was thinking. What things _hadn’t_ been hard lately? He wasn’t sleeping, he had no money. Manon took his bed, he was falling behind in all of his classes. He had figured something out about himself that terrified him. And then there was his mom.

“Well, primarily it’s been my mom. Things are really rough with her right now. She’s in a bad spell.”

“What’s going on?” asked Basile, leaning in. “Is she alright?”

The boys knew about Lucas’ mom’s condition, and that she often went through difficult times that could put a stress on Lucas. She had schizophrenia, which could change her mood and make her hallucinate and lose touch with reality among so many other things. It was by no means easy to deal with. But his friends didn’t know why it had gotten so much worse.

“Yeah, she just went off her meds for a while. And my dad refused to pay for her to stay at a facility anymore, so she’s living with him, and I haven’t been over to see her, and she’s been sending me these texts, and--” Lucas stopped. He didn’t want to pour all his troubles out at his friends’ feet.

But then Yann said, “And?”, and it all came out.

“And my dad won’t give me money, and if he did I wouldn’t want to take it, but it means I can’t pay rent, so I’m basically just leeching off my roommates, which makes me feel like shit, and I have to come into school early every morning so Imane can fucking tutor me because I’m failing, and Manon has come back and took my room and now I have to sleep on the couch, which doesn’t really matter because I’m not sleeping anyway, but now that I don’t have a room I don’t have anywhere to put my clothes so I can never find my hoodies so I’m fucking freezing!”t.

Wordlessly, Yann scooped his backpack off the ground and pulled out a spare sweatshirt.

“Thanks,” Lucas said, and shrugged it on. It was big, but it was warm. And then, because there was nothing else to say, he said it again. “Thanks.”

“Why didn’t you say anything to us?” Arthur asked.

“I didn’t want you guys to worry about me. I didn’t want to be more of a burden than I already am every time you guys have to pay for my food or I can’t pay my share for weed, because--”

“Damn it, Lucas, you’re not a burden!” Yann’s voice grew louder and then quieted back down when they all jumped. “You should’ve let us help you through these things.”

“I know,” Lucas replied. “I know. It’s just that it was really hard to say all that, and every time I was around you and I was stressing out about stuff, and you all had no idea… I didn’t know how to explain. I didn’t want you guys to think differently of me. And then it just got harder to be around you and feel like I was faking anything, and so it was easier to not be around you at all.”

Lucas looked back down at his thumbs, which were now faintly shaking. This was all true, of course, but there was more to it than he said. More to it still left unresolved. There was another big secret still underneath the surface, eating him alive. Something he knew was true, and was confirmed by his reaction to a simple smile that morning on the bus. He was gay, and his friends had no idea.

And they didn’t have to know just yet. Lucas was still having trouble saying the words out loud to himself (not that he had tried). For now, it was okay if these problems were the only ones the boys had to deal with. He didn’t want to scare them away so soon. After all, it was bad enough to just be the stupid insomniac with the psycho mom. He didn’t have to label himself as gay on top of all that, too.

“Lucas, we don’t think any differently of you.” Arthur said. “We just wish you had let us help you go through this instead of pushing us away.”

“Yeah,” Basile agreed. “You know, my mom has bipolar disorder. I know what it can be like to deal with that kind of stuff. And we’re not going to judge you for it.”

“Seriously, Lucas,” Yann said. “We’re your friends. We’re here for you when things are hard.”

Lucas just nodded. He felt an overwhelming affection for his friends in that moment, and he wanted to enjoy it for a moment before he remembered how undeserving he was.

“And anyway, you may be a burden, but you’re _our_ burden,” Basile said. “That will never change.” And as they all laughed, the tension was broken, and Lucas could hardly remember why he had been so desperate to distance himself from his friends. He briefly considered coming out to them now, when things were good. But as he looked at his friends’ laughing faces, joyous and warm even on this bitterly cold day, he decided not to ruin a good moment with the chance of rejection. Instead he just took a picture in his mind and swore to keep it forever, just for himself, just to remember this moment.

“And would you please stop hanging out with the girls so much? We miss you!” Arthur whined.

“Okay, okay,” Lucas said, laughing. “I’ll eat lunch with you guys again. But I really am friends with the girls now. They’re chill!”

“Daphne is!” Basile cut in, and the rest of them groaned.

“No, cunning is what she is! She roped me into painting over the mural in the common room.”

“What?” Yann asked. “You can’t paint.” He took a brown bag out of his backpack and handed Lucas half of his sandwich without a word. The gesture was subtle, but it made Lucas want to cry.

“Yeah, but Daphne thinks I can. Or she knows I can’t and she wants to catch me in the lie. Anyway I’m doing it a week from tomorrow. Does anyone care to join me?”

“Sorry man, you’re on your own,” Yann said. “We’re going to Ingrid’s party on that Friday night, and we’ll be trashed all day Saturday.”

“Oh, man I am so excited for that party! I can’t wait to charm Daphne with my killer dance moves,” Basile said, wiggling his eyebrows. Arthur shoved him.

“Oh, damn! I was supposed to go to that party too,” Lucas said. Did Daphne purposely schedule at the most inconvenient time? Must she do everything in the most annoying way?

“You can still come!” Basile offered.

“If you want to be our babysitter!” Arthur said.

“Hilarious. Oh well, we’ll see. I might just have to make an appearance at this party to see Basile’s new dance moves.”

“Oh, but I can show you now!” Basile jumped up and starting dancing, haphazardly tossing his limbs around. As they laughed, Lucas took a second picture in his mind. Every happy moment was one he wanted to remember.

* * *

**Friday 12:12**

Some hopeful part of Lucas had hoped that once he had told his friends about what was eating at him, it would be easier to sleep. He just assumed that with less stress bouncing around his brain, he would actually be able to fall asleep that night.

He was wrong.

He had set his phone away almost an hour before, desperate for sleep to come once it had passed midnight. Imane had told him that the light from technology kept you awake and that you had to put it away for a while before bed to actually be able to sleep. Even before Lucas had sleeping trouble, he had never found that to be true. 

He laid there with his eyes closed for a while, trying anything to fall asleep. He counted backwards from five hundred. He went back through his day in his mind. He even tried to recite his biology flashcards--something that always put him to sleep during the day.

But his mind kept getting stuck on the boy on the bus. In fact, that boy had not left his mind. Lucas pulled stills of his face from his memory and thought of them endlessly. He had been thinking of him and blushing all day. The only time he had left his mind was when he was with his friends, and even then the peace had not lasted. The images of that boy were ones Lucas simply could not purge his mind of. Worst of all, he didn’t want to.

That unhealthy obsession of the last few weeks had been multiplied now. His thoughts were turning dirty. He’d have to put in a lot of effort to push these thoughts away when he visited his mother the next day. He’d be seeing her for the first time in weeks.

He thought of what he’d say to her, how she’d be. He was constantly worried about her, but he was afraid if tomorrow’s visit would do better or worse to satisfy his fears. What if she was unhappy? What if her nurses weren’t treating her right? He just had to hope it would go well. He probably couldn’t carry on if he saw her struggling. Their relationship had been tumultuous in recent years, but he loved her very deeply.

His worrying got his mind fully awake, so he rolled over and reached for his phone. He had a feeling he wouldn’t be falling asleep until very late tonight, if he did at all. It wouldn’t hurt now to go online for a little while.

His fingers found the Polaris Youtube page without him even thinking about it. It was like muscle memory now, like when his brain carried him throughout the school day even when there were too many things on his mind for him to focus on Shakespeare or Socrates.

Something was different when he pulled up the page. He blinked. He focused his eyes. There was a new video posted.

It was short, only fifteen seconds long, but Lucas clicked on it as fast as he could.

There was a blank screen. Lucas watched it with his breath held and felt listened to the sound of his heart beating faster.

Then a message appeared, written in white. He hadn’t realized how much his hands were shaking until he had to stop them from shaking so he could read it.

_Hello, everyone. Thank you for all your support. It has not gone unnoticed._

The message was there and then it was gone and then another string of sentences appeared. Lucas took in this information as well as he could without collapsing into relieved sobs and emotion.

_I have lacked inspiration recently. It has not been easy. But I saw something today that motivated me._

Another slide appeared:

_Find me on Instagram to enter Polaris once again with me. If you can._

Then the screen went black again and the video ended. Lucas watched it three more times before it all could fully sink in.

Two hundred people had already watched it and flooded the comments. He felt a smile appear on his face as he read their reactions. They were all happily celebrating and making jokes. He felt a lot of pride for this little corner of the internet, these people who had found and made themselves a community. It was something he was glad to be a part of.

Everyone, including Lucas, was confused about the last two sentences. The comments were talking about an Instagram about, but no one had mentioned the name of it. Lucas quickly exited Youtube and opened Instagram. He found the search bar and typed “Polaris,” but the only thing that appeared were businesses. He tried a bunch of combinations, including “Polaris star” and “Polaris Youtube” until he tried his luck with “enter Polaris.”

It brought him to an account with three pictures. The pictures had no captions, but they were uploaded today and were colored in the same mystical dark way the Polaris videos were. His heart soared. Even without any context, he knew this account was what the video had been talking about.

He scanned over the account. The pictures all contained full letters or cut off letters, and there was no connection between them. But the bio said “‘3/9” and “decode the riddle to find my real account,” so Lucas figured that this was better than nothing. It was a start. Somebody else could decode the riddle later.

The account had no followers or likes. Somehow, Lucas was the first person here. He knew he wouldn’t be for long. He knew the fanbase was not far behind him in finding this account. But he was proud of himself for finding it, and so easily at that, so he bit back the anxiety that arose at every little social media interaction and liked the pictures. All three, in a row. And then he followed the account and exited the app before he could change his mind.

He went back to the video’s comments and refreshed them for a few minutes. He watched as they all found the Instagram account and conspired over what it could mean. He didn’t say anything, but he watched them discuss and share their theories and opinions. It made him feel a little less alone and a little more hopeful for the future of Polaris.

There were people watching, and the creator knew. He or she hadn’t been hit by a bus or killed in a plane crash or forgotten their password or dropped the endeavor altogether. It wasn’t over. There was more to come, maybe. And Lucas had found the Instagram page first.

He refreshed the comments until the influx of them slowed, and he drifted off to sleep with a small smile on his face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There it is! I hope you enjoyed! I'd like to thank Lorde because her music has been my fuel lately. I think the first chapter was a bit rocky, because it was the first chapter of an AU and they always are because you have a lot of plot to set up, but I saw an improvement here and I hope you did too! I'm so excited to write more. Don't be afraid to comment or message me on Tumblr @/ symphony4the devil !


	3. I've Just Been Watching the World as it's Turning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Yeah, what are you doing?” Mika repeated as he hurtled towards the fridge, nearly tripping over Lisa as he grabbed two eggs. “Are you doing something in secret? Are you going to meet a lover?”  
> “It’s none of your business,” Lucas replied.   
> “No waffles for those who keep secrets!”  
> “I think you overestimate how badly I want a waffle.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Here's the third chapter. It ended up being longer than I expected, so it took longer than I thought to write and edit. Anyway, it's here now, and the next chapter is steadily in the works. That's when the plot reallyyy starts. 
> 
> I hope you'll enjoy this chapter. It deals a lot with Lucas's mom and there's also some quality time shared between the flat. I love writing their dynamic.
> 
> Chapter title comes from "Night Bus" by Gabrielle Aplin. (I've really been trying to accurately name my chapters, haha. That was an essential part of my outline when I layed out the fic. It's really just for me, but some of the later ones come from songs I really feel fit each chapter.)

**Samedi 09:24**

Mika was not a graceful person; this was something Lucas knew to be true. But most days Mika was careful with his calamity, more hesitant about tossing around the heavier objects, quieter with his rambunctious voice. Today was  _ not  _ one of those days.

“Good morning, Lucas!” Mika called out to him. “Pass me that pan!”

Lucas had stumbled into the kitchen in his pajamas to find his roommates gathered in the tiny space. Lisa was on the floor in front of the fridge sorting through weeks-old containers. Mika was standing in front of the stove, where Lucas found the source of all the early-morning racket: his roommate was covered in flour, three bowls before him filled with contents Lucas couldn’t even guess at. Mika waved giddily, as if he weren’t covered in breakfast ingredients.

Manon was sitting on the counter sipping coffee out of a ceramic blue mug. She gave him a warm smile. She took a sip from her mug and kindly held it out to Lucas. He gave her a slight smile and moved past her to pour his own.

“Ignore him. He has a thing about sharing drinks,” he heard Mika say behind him. “You know how Lucas can be in the morning.”

“Maybe I just have a thing about people being loud when I’m trying to sleep,” Lucas said.

“Hush, Lucas. Drink your coffee and you’ll feel better.” Lucas poured himself a cup of coffee and leaned against the counter next to Manon. It  _ did  _ make him feel better. Sometimes he felt like coffee kept the group together. It was the only thing in their cabinets that didn’t have a name on it. The first person awake always made a pot for everyone, and it was the only thing that no one took the last of without asking. Everyone respected that they all needed caffeine to survive.

Well, everyone but Mika, who contained enough energy in a single pinky to keep a small country functioning for years. He bounced -as much as a person could in their tiny kitchen- from counter to counter, scooping up spoons and pans in a seemingly aimless way.

“May I ask what you’re doing?” Lucas said.

“You may not.”

Lucas scoffed, but Manon smiled.

“He’s trying to make us breakfast,” she said. “He thought maybe you were a bit down.”

“I did not!” Mika said. “I just had a burning desire for waffles.”

“You had a burning desire for waffles but not pancakes?” Lisa asked. “Lucas is the one who likes waffles. You like pancakes and I like eggs and Manon likes toast.” It was true. If coffee united them, breakfast food preferences divided them.

Mika continued working. As Lucas observed his movements, it did seem like he was making waffles. In a very… interesting way.

“Did you think to look up directions?” he asked.

“Directions are for losers,” Mika said. “They take out the best flavour of all, which is, of course, love.”

“That makes no sense.”

“It does! You just can’t taste it because it’s been a while since your waffles have been love-filled. Let me fill you with love.”

“This is beginning to sound dirty,” Manon cut in. “And I don’t think those waffles are going to fill us with love, anyway. They’re more likely to fill us with food poisoning.”

“Don’t take his side, Manon!” Mika said as Lucas and Manon laughed.

“But really, Mika, you don’t have to make anything for me. I’m feeling perfectly fine. See?” He opened his mouth in a wide smile that was clearly fake. “Super happy.”

Mika just looked at him over his shoulder with disbelief.

“You do seem well today, Lucas,” Manon said. “Sleep alright?” And then she cringed slightly, realizing what she said may have been insensitive; after all, the fact was that she had come marching back into his life and into his place, and suddenly made him the odd one out. And usually, Manon mentioning the bedroom thing, even accidentally, would remind him of this all like a stab in the gut.

But today he just smiled genuinely and told her yes, he had. Because it was true, and because Manon deserved more sympathy than he gave her. Her life hadn’t been easy, either. Last year, she had come back from London after a nasty breakup between her and her boyfriend, Charles. She had slept on the couch, then, insisting that it was only temporary. Then she had moved on to some other guy, whose name Lucas couldn’t remember, but he knew it had caused some drama with her and the girls, specifically Imane. 

Then she had somehow gotten back with Charles and went back to London. When she showed back up at the flat a few months ago, it was because they had broken up again, and permanently this time. When she had taken Lucas’s place in the flat -when he already felt bad about not being able to pay rent on time and eating the others’ food- he had unfairly put a lot of blame on her. But it wasn’t her fault she wanted to come back to a place she felt safe in after ending a long relationship. And it wasn’t her fault he was such a burden on the rest of them. That was Lucas’s fault and Lucas’s fault only.

“What are you doing today, Lucas?” Manon asked. “Would you want to join me and the girls? We’re going shopping for furniture to renovate the common room.”

Lucas remembered the last time he had helped them with that, a year ago, when they had only wanted him to help drag a dusty old couch back to school. That invitation was out of necessity. Lucas hated knowing this one was out of pity.

“No, but thank you, Manon. I actually have plans today.”

“What are you doing?” Lisa asked from her spot on the floor.

“Yeah, what are you doing?” Mika repeated as he hurtled towards the fridge, nearly tripping over Lisa as he grabbed two eggs. “Are you doing something in secret? Are you going to meet a lover?”

“It’s none of your business,” Lucas replied. 

“No waffles for those who keep secrets!”

“I think you overestimate how badly I want a waffle.”

Mika faked hurt and clutched a hand over his heart.

“Suit yourself, Lucas! More for the rest of us.” Lisa and Manon groaned. Lucas checked the time again.

“I really should be going,” he said, hopping off the counter and placing his mug in the sink. “Thanks for making the waffles, even if they are probably toxic. It’s the thought that counts. I’ll see you guys later.”

He left the kitchen, but it didn’t stop him from hearing the conversation behind him.

“I think that’s the most I’ve heard him say all at once in weeks,” Mika whispered; but Mika could not do  _ anything  _ quietly, so it was a very audible whisper. Lucas stopped when he heard it, just before turning into the bathroom. “He must be feeling better.”

“He looks well,” Manon said at a normal volume.

“How do you even know he was feeling down, Mika?” asked Lisa. Lucas heard her fumbling with containers as she spoke. “Maybe he was just tired of you bothering him.”

“No, Lisa. It’s so easy to tell with Lucas. Sometimes I don’t think he’s very okay at all, no matter how happily he might act in front of us.”

That made Lucas annoyed, and so he pulled himself into the bathroom with a quick slam of the door. He heard their voices continue, unbothered by the slam, but he could no longer make out what they were saying.

He hadn’t been putting on a happy act for anyone. Must every move of his be scrutinized by Mika? Lucas put his hands on the sink and looked in the mirror. He blew a piece of hair out of his face and looked straight into his own eyes. Mika’s voice rang in his head.  _ Sometimes I don’t think he’s very okay at all. _

Was that true? As Lucas questioned it, his anger dissipated into an emotion Lucas liked much less: fear.  _ Was  _ he okay? He could get out of bed in the morning. He could get through the day just fine. Mika was the only person in his life who had raised such a concern.

But as he looked at himself, he was afraid. Even if he was functioning, something did feel off. Something felt wrong. It was just hard to laugh or smile, sometimes. That was all.

He focused on his reflection and practiced a wide smile in the mirror. It didn’t look fake, but it felt foreign. He thought of Basile’s dancing the day before at lunch and tried to brew genuineness. It had made him smile then, after all. But the smile he saw now was fake, like the one he had put on for Mika just a few minutes ago.

He felt good now. He didn’t feel as bad as he had a few days before. The brief encounter with the boy on the bus the day prior had picked up his mood. But maybe Mika was right. Maybe he still wasn’t back to his old self.

Another thought entered his mind: maybe it wasn’t even that he wasn’t his old self. Maybe it was just getting harder to pretend to be who he wasn’t. The boy on the bus had reinforced, more than ever, the thing Lucas had known to be true.

He was gay. He liked boys. He always had and always would. And it was getting harder to hide.

And today wouldn’t be any different. He was going to see his mother for the first time in a while. He couldn’t even remember how long it had been, but he knew he was a bad son for letting it be so long. Life was just as hard on her as it was Lucas -harder, even- and he knew she had to be missing him, even if he was the worst son in the world.

He shook off the thoughts that had been bothering him just moments before and reached for his toothbrush. Today was going to be a good day. It just had to be. For his mom, because she needed it, and because Lucas did too.

* * *

 

**Samedi 10:03**

It was a much nicer day than the one before, so Lucas decided to walk to the facility where his mom was living. It wasn’t very close, but he wanted the walk to clear his head. He hadn’t seen his mother for a while and he didn’t know what to expect from her. She might not even be lucid. She certainly hadn’t been a week ago, when a nurse called him to tell him it would be nice if he visited soon, because his mother’s hallucinations were getting worse and her meds weren’t working as well as they had been when she was checked in. But that was a week ago, and if there was anything Lucas knew from growing up with his mom, it was that her state of mind could very easily fluctuate.

Though it had been more than thirty minutes, Lucas felt as if he had just left the flat by the time he came upon the facility. Probably because he still wasn’t ready. Taking a deep breath, he entered. The place was white and clean and proper -everything that reminded Lucas of hospitals and made him feel sick. It felt so clinical, and had since the first time Lucas had been there, when his father angrily checked in his hysterical mother.

It hadn’t made him a fan of the place, and neither had his second visit, when his mother was too unstable to realize he was there. She had just kept looking past him and muttering about the Bible as he watched, unable to help her.

As far as he knew, the workers were nice. That was the saving grace he reminded himself of every time he felt guilty about not seeing her; at least she was in good hands. The nurse smiled at him as he approached the desk. He had never seen her before, but there she had a comforting aura.

“I’m here to see my mother,” he croaked. The words were hard to say. If he were a good son, he would have been used to saying them by now. “Marie Lallemant.”

“Of course.” The nurse smiled kindly. “We’ve been hoping to see you.”

_ I know _ , he thought.  _ I know, I’m sorry _ .

“Come, dear, follow me,” she said, getting up. She was wearing scrubs. Lucas wondered how well she knew his mother by know. It was probably better than he did.

She led him out of the main waiting room down another clean white hallway. They passed an open space where a dozen people were sitting in a circle in some sort of discussion. He watched a man with shaking hands gesture to the group as he passed by.

The nurse saw him looking. “There are group therapy meetings several times a week. A lot of our patients find it helpful to talk to others about what they’re going through.”

“Oh,” he said. “Yeah. That’s cool. Um, does my mom ever go?”

“Sometimes,” she said, looking back to give him a warm but sad smile. “Not so much recently.”

“Oh.” He swallowed.

They reached a wing with a bunch of doors that Lucas assumed led into bedrooms. It kind of reminded him of the college dorms he had seen on T.V. This was a dorm for crazy people, maybe.

The nurse stopped in front of a door on the left side of the hall and spun around to look at Lucas. She was wearing a cautious expression. For the first time, Lucas looked at her name tag.  _ Michelle _ .

Michelle’s eyes were sad as she looked at Lucas. “Your mother’s meds have not been working so well recently. She’s been struggling to stay focused and coherent. She might not be responsive to you. We’re really not sure. Anything can change her mood.”

Lucas nodded. His heart was beating faster. Michelle caught his nervousness.

“Don’t worry, dear. I think seeing you will cheer her up. Let’s go in together.”

Lucas nodded and followed her in.

There was more light in the room than he remembered from the last time, but everything looked cold, including his mother. She was sitting in a rocking chair, swaying slowly as she looked out the window at the trees. Lucas was glad that she didn’t have a view of the street. Looking out at nature seemed much more relaxing.

He looked around the room, noticing how it had changed from his last visit. It looked a lot more lived-in now, with a few books and magazines strewn about. It wasn’t tidy anymore, either, but it wasn’t a complete mess. It seemed like someone perfectly normal lived here.

His mom must have heard them come in, but she didn’t move from her place by the window. She didn’t even look over.

“Marie,” the nurse said gently, going over to his mother and lightly touching her on the shoulder. “Marie, there’s someone here to see you.”

“Maman,” Lucas said. He didn’t know where to stand. He felt like a stranger in that room, and it was a painful, guilty feeling. “It’s me, Lucas.”

“Lucas?” she said. Her voice was softer than it usually was. She was more fragile. “Come here, my son. Let me look at you.”

Michelle backed up so Lucas could take her place at his Mom’s side.

“Hi, Maman,” he said. “How are you?”

She looked up at him with her big brown eyes. She seemed confused at seeing him. He couldn’t blame her.

Thankfully, she didn’t seem mad. His mother reached up a hand and he leaned in closer so she could touch his cheek, and though her fingers were much bonier than they should’ve been, there was just as much warmth emitting from her touch as there had been when she held his hand as a child.

Lucas felt an overwhelming love for his mother. “I’m so sorry, Maman, I’m so sorry.” His tears fell and she caught them with her hand.

“It’s okay, my son. It’s okay. You are here and we are together now.”

* * *

 

**Samedi 2:47**

He sat there with his mom and talked for hours. He told him about Mika and Lisa and the flatshare, and Manon and the girls. She asked him dozens of questions about the boys, whom she missed, and told him about her life at the facility. It had been three months since she arrived and she was beginning to think of it has home; Lucas could not decide if this was a good or bad thing.

They never talked about his father, but his mom did ask multiple times if he had enough money and was being taken care of. He had to assure her that, yes, he had enough to eat, and even if he didn’t, his flatmates would never let him starve. She laughed at his stories about the flatshare and Lucas was delighted to hear the sound. In fact, he laughed too.

Michelle came back in at some points to give his mom her food or pills, and on the last time she came in, she decided it was time for Marie to nap.

Lucas had wanted to stay, but his mom told him not to be silly, to go home and rest for himself, and so he swore to come back soon and followed Michelle back out into the hall.

He felt that a weight had been lifted off his shoulders, and there had been a pressure on his chest that was missing now. He had been used to it, but his breaths came easier without it, and he let out a small laugh -more of relief than anything- to Michelle when they were alone in the hallway.

“She seems good, right?” he said, feeling hopeful for the first time in too long.

“She does,” Michelle said. “She is. But that might not last, okay?”

His face fell.  “Right, I mean, I know that, it’s just…”

“I know you want to be hopeful right now, and you should be. But I want you to be prepared. The next time you visit might not go as well as today did. Some days are harder than others.”

He nodded. That pressure from his chest was creeping its way back in. He dreaded it more now that he had known life without it, even if for a few brief moments, and he pushed it away to give Michelle a small smile.

“Don’t worry, Lucas. She’s going to be okay. You just have to be patient and take it slow. Take it day by day.”

_ Day by day _ . He liked that. Michelle reminded him of a grandmother. He couldn’t help but trust her. “Okay. Okay, thank you. I’ll come back soon, I promise.”

“I hope you do. But don’t be too hard on yourself. Coming here isn’t the easiest thing to do. It’s hard for anyone to see someone they love like this, but it’s especially hard to see a parent. Children don’t do well to see their parents weak. When they’re not, when you have to be strong for them…Well, it’s hard. But know that no one expects too much of you. If you just want to come and eat with her, or read to her, it could help. Just be there for her until she’s able to be there for you as well. It’s all we can ask of her right now.”

“Right. Right, okay. I can do that. I think so, at least.”

She smiled warmly. She had a nice smile. “You know what, Lucas? I haven’t known you for very long, but I  _ know  _ you can.”

* * *

 

**Samedi 8:34**

Mika came home demanding that they order pizza for dinner in celebration of him getting the number of some guy he worked with. Or maybe it was just another ploy to cheer Lucas up -not that he even needed to be cheered up. Anyway, Lucas was fine with it, because Mika said the cost was on him.

“So, Lucas,” Mika said as he settled between Lucas and Lisa on the couch. Manon was on the floor, dabbing the grease off her slice of pizza with a napkin. “Would you please enlighten the rest of us as to where you were today?”

“Seriously, Mika, you’re still on this?” Manon asked, rolling her eyes.

“I’m just curious to know what our little Lulu was up to! Is that a crime?”

“Please don’t call me that,” Lucas said. “I get that from enough people as it is. And if you must know, I went to go visit my mom.”

Nobody said anything for a minute. Lucas’s rocky relationship with his mother was not a secret. He hadn’t told Mika all the details, but he was able to figure it out like he always did. (Mika was unusually perceptive.) And if Mika knew, then the rest of the flat knew, too, and while Lucas didn’t mind, it was sort of annoying when there was dead silence in moments like these.

“Is anyone going to say anything?” he asked.

“Ah, yes, well, terrific! How did that go?” said Mika.

“It went well,” Lucas replied, taking a bite of pizza. “She’s doing okay.”

“That’s great, Lucas,” Lisa said.

“Yeah, it really is,” Manon agreed. “It’s nice you went to see her. I’m sure it made her really happy.”

“Yeah, it did. I’m going to go see her more often.”

“That’s really cool, Lucas.” Mika playfully nudged him as he spoke. “Good for you two.”

They ate the rest of their dinner amidst relaxed conversation, talking about random things like celebrity gossip and television shows. Later, when the food had made them tired, they all lay around the living room watching the TV.

A thought occurred to Lucas that hadn’t occurred all day. He pulled out his phone and went to the Polaris YouTube page. Then he checked the cryptic Instagram page with the three posts. Besides a bunch of new comments from desperate fans, there was nothing. He sighed.

“What’s that?” Mika asked from over his shoulder. “Are you looking at those videos you like again?”

“Yeah,” Lucas said. “The creator made an Instagram account, but there hasn’t been any news so far besides a few confusing posts.”

“You really like those videos, don’t you?” asked Manon from the other side of the couch.

“Yes, I do. And I want to hear any updates as soon as they come, but so far it’s been pretty silent.”

“Well why don’t you just direct-message the Instagram account?” Manon suggested.

“Manon, that’s a great idea!” Mika agreed. Lisa was too absorbed in the TV to join the conversation. “You should, Lucas! What’s the worst that could happen?”

Lucas considered for a moment. He could very well DM the Instagram account. But what if he didn’t even get a response? What if the creator was annoyed at him for being desperate? What if he spoke to the creator and they were actually a jerk in real life? He didn’t want to risk any of those things.

“No. No, I’d rather not.”

“Suit yourself,” Mika said, scooting over to give Lucas some space once again. “But if you ever change your mind, don’t hesitate to ask me what to say! I’m the king of sliding into DM’s.”

“We know,” Manon said dryly, and Lucas laughed as Mika protested.

* * *

 

That night, as he tried to fall asleep, he realized he felt more peaceful than he had for a while. And when sleep eventually  _ did  _ come, it was a boring, dreamless night. He had loved dreams as a kid. He had loved sharing them with his parents and friends. He had even kept a diary of them. It had been a while since he dreamed, let alone had a really good one.

But that was okay. As long as he was getting some sleep, he didn’t need any dreams or excitement.  He was thankful to be getting any sleep. He’d take it as it came, and not ask for more. He knew better than anyone that sometimes, happy thoughts were just too much to ask for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed! That last part was really sad for me to write, but in this chapter I really wanted to drill in how bad Lucas feels. He feels like a bad roommate and son, and he's increasingly aware that it's getting harder to hide a big part of him, and he's noticing he's not really okay. 
> 
> Anyway, if you liked this please leave a kudos and comment, and stay tuned for the next chapter, because that's when he'll meet Eliott. You can also reach me on Tumblr at symphony4thedevil. Til next time :)


	4. I Was Enchanted to Meet You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “It’s nice to meet you, Lucas. I’m Eliott.”  
> Eliott. Eliott. There was a name to the face now, and Lucas wanted to say it over and over again for the rest of his life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! Here's the new chapter. It's my favorite so far, and I think it should be obvious why. Chapter title comes from "Enchanted" by Taylor Swift, a song that fits this chapter really well, so there's your suggested listening if you wanted any, haha. (Fair warning, this is not the last Taylor Swift lyric you'll be seeing as a chapter title. Her entire discography is seared into my brain. In the best way. )

**Lundi 6:37**

After going to see his mom, Lucas slept through the rest of the weekend with ease. It was a rest he needed, but he hadn’t known just how badly he needed it until he got up that morning before his alarm even had the chance to go off. He was well-rested and when he looked in the mirror he noticed the bags under his eyes were gone and the blue coloring in his eyes was brighter.

It was going to be a good day, Lucas knew. He could practically feel it. As he got ready, the energy around him was electric.

He left early for the bus stop, so early that he arrived in time for the earlier bus. The driver of that first bus had looked at him curiously, but Lucas waved him away. No, not today. Today he’d be taking for the bus he always took. (Because there was someone he wanted to see and because it would do no use to be at school early. Imane always arrived exactly on time.)

Lucas had a plan, if one could even call it such. The idea hadn’t been perfectly crafted, and it wasn’t as much a plan as a goal. But Lucas had woken up that morning knowing he was going to say something to the boy on the bus. At least to get his name, just so he could put a name on the face that was ever-revolving in his mind.

Lucas would look over at him when he got on, and if the boy was looking, Lucas would go over to him. Maybe.Truthfully, the whole ordeal depended on the moment; Lucas wasn’t so sure he wouldn’t chicken out at the last second.

But when the bus pulled up, Lucas hopped on with an uncertain feeling in his stomach. Sort of like butterflies, but heavier and more tumultuous- his stomach was rolling in waves by the time he had paid his fare.  

He turned into the bus, eyes already trained on the back corner. He was holding his breath and his jaw was clenched. Would he smile? Would he wave? Would the boy even be looking?

But there was no one there.

The bus was more deserted than it usually was, and the boy was missing. He just wasn’t there. Lucas felt the tidal waves in his stomach calm, but they were soon replaced by a solemn weight. He had been expecting something today -somewhat naively, he knew- and it was crushing to be met with emptiness. He had thought the boy would be there. For all of Lucas’ worrying about how their encounter might go, he had never accounted for him not being there.

“Hello!” said a chipper voice at his hip. Lucas looked down and nearly jumped. Actually, he was so startled he  _ did  _ jump.

It was him. Sitting right there, in the second row, looking up at Lucas with an amused smile on his face. Lucas would have laughed if his heart wasn’t lodged in his throat.

He tried to talk, but it came out as a squeak. He blushed and cleared his throat. Trying again, he said, “Hello.” It was a faint sound, but at least it was noise.

The boy was still looking at him. Lucas noticed he was probably waiting for him to say more. If so, that was too bad, because Lucas’s brain was going haywire. (Seriously, there was a buzzing in his ears. If he lived past this moment it would be a miracle.)

“Ah, do you want to sit?” asked the boy. He looked a bit confused, but still amused. Lucas blushed harder.

“Um, yes, I mean, if that’s okay with you,” he stammered.

“Yes, it’s definitely okay with me.”

Lucas sat across from the boy so that they were facing each other and began to glance back and forth between him and the window. Was he expecting Lucas to carry out a conversation? Because Lucas could barely remember his own name.

Lucas looked out the window, but nothing was registering; it was all he could do to stay upright. He tried to shake off that imbalanced feeling. There was no reason to be so nervous. This was just a person, a probably-straight person, who was sitting across from him on the bus. This was a normal encounter. Completely chill.

So why was his heart pounding so fast?

“Can I ask you something?” the boy said, pulling Lucas out of his own head. He dazedly nodded.  _ He wants to ask me something. He wants to ask  _ me  _ something. He wants to  _ ask  _ me something.  _ “What was that shirt you were wearing last time?”

_ Last time _ , he said. Lucas pondered the significance of this. The last time they were on the bus he had been wearing his Polaris shirt, he could recall that well enough. But the boy had said  _ last time _ , as if there had been multiple times. Was theirs a relationship of multiple  _ times _ ? Lucas looked at him everyday. Did that count?

Lucas pushed aside these notions. He was reading far too much into a simple phrase. All the boy meant was the last time they were on the bus. Lucas was nothing if not an extreme overthinker. (You’d think that might help in school, but physics and biology were concepts he could never understand. Quite like he couldn’t understand this boy, whose expression was growing more expectant every millisecond Lucas spent deliberating the details.) Lucas wrenched his head out of the clouds.

“Uh, it was a gift. It’s a fan’s art from this YouTube series, uh, Polaris? I don’t know if you might have heard of it. But um, I like it, this series I mean, and someone gave it to me as a gift. The shirt.”

He was rambling. He was rambling and he couldn’t meet the boy’s eyes, so he looked at his fingers and out the window and basically anywhere but those eyes -those eyes that had not failed to catch and seize his attention, an even more piercing blue than they had been from a distance. Yes, he was definitely noticing the boy’s eyes.

“That’s so cool. Who was it that gave it to you? Was it a birthday present or something?”

“Ah, no, not a birthday present. It was from my roommate, Mika, and I don’t know why. Well, I guess I do, but not really, it’s just that he thinks he has to take care of me and cheer me up or something... I don’t really know why he concerns himself with that but he gave me the shirt just because, I guess.” Lucas looked up at the boy.

_ I’m sorry _ , he said in his mind.  _ I’m sorry that just made no sense and that I suck at conversation but can you stop looking at me with those eyes because I can’t think straight. _

He didn’t say that. Instead he just bit his lip.

“Mika sounds cool. Everyone deserves someone to make sure they’re happy,” he said. He smiled again, even as he talked, and it made Lucas smile too. It was one of those contagious smiles, the best kind. Lucas couldn’t help but to return it.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right. He can be annoying sometimes, but he is pretty cool.”

“How is he annoying?”

“Ah,” Lucas said, letting out a tiny laugh. “How  _ isn’t  _ he? No, but he’s not too bad. He just has a very extreme personality, that’s all.” Lucas didn’t say that he sometimes felt like Mika’s personality (along with Manon’s and even quiet Lisa’s) took up too much room in the flat they shared, and Lucas had to wedge his own timid psyche in a dusty corner.

He didn’t feel like that was happening now, in any case. It was nice being around someone who didn’t really know you yet. And this boy’s personality was not overbearing. It seemed happy, and light, and fizzy, but it just wasn’t that kind of all-consuming.

“I can understand that. But he sounds nice anyway. It’s always good to have people that care about you.”

“Yeah, you’re right. It is.”

They were silent for a moment, but Lucas wasn’t stressed anymore. This boy carried a calming presence. Lucas didn’t find himself getting wrapped up in his own head like he did so often now when his brain was overflowing. His nerves were gone, replaced by a warm feeling sparking against his skin. This silence was comfortable.

But that didn’t mean Lucas didn’t appreciate its breaking.

“So, I know your roommate’s name, but not yours. That’s kind of strange, don’t you think?”

Lucas laughed, and it was a great feeling -like a rush of bubbles and light to his heart; like the finest champagne shot straight into his bloodstream.

“Lucas. My name is Lucas.”

“Lucas,” he repeated, and Lucas felt his heart pounding. The way he said his name made Lucas lightheaded. He said it like it was something sacred. He said it again. “Lucas. Lucas.”

Lucas gripped the seat with white knuckles and tried not to faint.

“It’s nice to meet you, Lucas. I’m Eliott.”

Eliott. Eliott. There was a name to the face now, and Lucas wanted to say it over and over again for the rest of his life.

“It’s nice to meet you, too, Eliott.”

Eliott smiled, so Lucas did too. Eliott looked out the window, and Lucas followed his gaze. Eliott frowned, and Lucas matched it; he didn’t know what they were frowning at, but if Eliott was upset at something, Lucas wanted to be too.

“Oh, this is your stop,” Eliott said. “That’s too bad.” (He sounded like he really did think it was “too bad”.)

Lucas was equally devastated and elated: Eliott knew this was his stop! He had been paying enough attention to Lucas to know that! It hadn’t all been in his head!

But it also meant he had to get off.

“Oh, man. Yeah, it is.” The bus slowed to a stop. Lucas got up hesitantly. He didn’t know what to say. He still had so many questions. Had this only been a one-time thing? Were they going to sit next to each other again? Would they go back to being strangers? Lucas really didn’t want that.

Eliott interrupted his panicked thoughts. “See you tomorrow!”

“See you tomorrow,” Lucas replied instantly. His voice was weak again, but he wanted to jump from happiness. Oh, how badly he wanted to see Eliott tomorrow. He wanted to see him every day after that, too. Every tomorrow, forever. “It was really nice talking to you. See you tomorrow.”

Lucas didn’t even have the time to cringe at his own repetition, because Eliott said “I can’t wait,” and Lucas’s mind went fuzzy.

* * *

**Lundi 7:21**

“Lucas! Lucas! Are you even paying attention?” Imane was impatiently snapping her fingers in front of his face. She was right to call him out; he  _ hadn’t  _ been paying attention.

“Sorry, Imane. I’m just distracted today. I had a busy weekend.” That was a partial lie. Yes, the visit with his mother had been draining, but he had slept for nearly all of the previous day to recuperate from it. He was wide awake now, and there was no discernable need to be distracted.

Except there  _ was _ , because he was thinking about Eliott, who had not left his mind since he greeted him on the bus for the first time less than an hour ago. It had only been their first conversation, but it had not stopped replaying itself through Lucas’s mind for even a second. He remembered every tiny detail perfectly, and cherished them all. It was hard to believe he had only met Eliott that morning. There was a familiarity to him that Lucas desperately latched onto.

“Okay, well, this is important. We have a test tomorrow.” Imane was not the most tolerant of distracted people, Lucas knew, and he didn’t want to upset her. She was, of course, helping him out of no benefit to herself. He was enough of a burden on her as it was. The least he could do was pay attention.

And she was right; they  _ did  _ have a test the next day, and it wasn’t going to be an easy one. And with  _ le bac _ coming around the corner, he couldn’t afford to miss out on a moment of revision.

“Okay, you’re right. I’m sorry. What were you saying?”

She began to go back over something about cells, and Lucas was forced to push Eliott out of his mind. It had been nearly a month of daily extra help with Imane, and he still wasn’t understanding much. She was right; he had to start paying attention. If not now, when he was well-rested for once, then when?

They were in the common room, and every time there was a break in their studying as Imane answered a text or flipped through the textbook to find something for Lucas to work on (usually the latter), he found himself looking at the wall. Specifically, the disastrous mural upon it.

It had been there since the common room was formed, a scar on the otherwise perfect room Daphne had personally designed. At first, a year ago, when the room was opened up, no one wanted to paint it. Then there were some issues with the principal wanting to close down the room, and that had resulted in a sit-in, which won the students the right to use it. But by that point the principal was no longer willing to let them paint over the mural, even if it was terribly ugly. It was only a month ago that Daphne had finally gotten the permission to get it painted over.

It wasn’t even a mural, really. That’s just what Daphne had gotten everyone calling it so they wouldn’t call it what it really was: graffiti. From the nineties, probably. It was truly atrocious. Imane caught him looking up and followed his gaze.

“Oh, yeah. You’re taking care of that this weekend, aren’t you?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I can’t paint for shit, you know.”

“I had a feeling.”

“What? How?”

“You’re not very hard to read,” she said.

He thought this over. Was he really such an open book? He couldn’t get much past Mika or Manon, sure, but he lived with them. Had the secrets he been hiding been common knowledge all along?

_ No _ , he told himself.  _ Don’t be silly. No one knows _ . Maybe he wasn’t hard to read, but his secrets were safe. No one knew he was gay, besides Mika, and who he had yet to hide anything from, and possibly Manon, who could have just as easily heard it from Mika or figured it out for herself.

It wasn’t that he was ashamed. Well, he was, a bit. His mother was extremely religious, and he had grown up knowing it was a sin to be gay. He didn’t care so much about the sinning part of it, really. The way he thought, it was more like the gay part of him felt too demanding of him. That was what really had him keeping it a secret still. He didn’t want to have to deal with prying questions. He didn’t want to have to risk his friendships because of who he was. And he definitely wasn’t ready to start figuring out who he was as Gay Lucas. He didn’t even know who he was as Regular Lucas.

Plus, he wasn’t even that gay. He wasn’t going to dress like a girl or wear makeup or anything. And he wasn’t going to go march in rallies and fight for his civil rights. He just wanted a normal life.  

“Lucas, are you alright? You keep getting distracted.” Imane was annoyed, but there was something else in her voice. Worry. Lucas really didn’t want anyone else worrying about him. Mika’s incessant caring was bad enough, no matter what he had said about it with Eliott-  _ Eliott _ . Just the name going through his mind brought a shiver.

“Yeah, really, Imane, I’m great,” he said, because it was true that meeting Eliott had picked up his already good mood. He was practically joyful now -it’s only that that made it even harder to focus.

“Okay,” she said warily. “I’ll believe you. But only if you can name the steps of mitosis in order.”

He laughed. She was relentless, but it made her the perfect tutor, because Lucas was an idiot. Relentless was what he needed.

* * *

**Lundi 2:58**

He had spent all of English class in a daze. By the third time he missed his teacher calling his name, she was so fed up she threw him out of class. 

It was Lucas’s last class of the day, so he just went home. He wanted to take the bus, but he had blown all his money at lunch with the boys. They left school grounds to go a nice restaurant because it was Arthur’s birthday. Arthur probably would’ve been happier with fast food, honestly, but it was more about the gesture. Lucas had gladly chipped in for the meal, but it bankrupted him.

If he wasn’t so busy with school, he might’ve gotten a job. But in all honesty, even if he had the time, it just would’ve been more stress he didn’t need. He couldn’t picture himself working anywhere. He had no clue what he even wanted to do with his life; he didn’t want to waste any time serving food or cleaning floors.

His phone pinged as he walked, so he pulled it out to check his messages. It was a text from his father.

**Papa: Hello, Lucas, just checking in. I hope all is well with you and your mother. Please let me know if you need any money.**

Lucas held back a snarl and shoved the phone back in his pocket without sending a response. To anyone else, the message would look kind, unselfish, maybe even indicative of a caring father. But Lucas knew the truth: that behind his father’s empty words were even emptier feelings, and the man wouldn’t have known “caring” if it smacking him in the face.

His father had spent nearly all of Lucas’s life in a loving relationship with his mother, but he had never been helpful when her mental illness  struck against her. He had been hurtful sometimes, and often refused to help her through it or get her the help she needed. That meant Lucas had to take care of his mother from a young age, something he had to quickly learn to be capable of for the both of their sakes.

A few months ago, when his mother had entered a particularly bad episode after being okay for years, it apparently put too much stress on his father. He had left, hastily checking Lucas’s mom into a mental health facility before running off to Lyon with a woman Lucas guessed was a mistress.

His parents were still technically married, but the entire family was separated. They were a group that had once been so close living under three separate roofs. Lucas’s father paid his mother’s hospital bills, but that was about it. He offered to send Lucas money from time to time, but Lucas never even considered taking it. He blamed his father for selfishly ripping the family apart; in Lucas’s mind, that was dirty money. He’d rather starve.

When he was almost home, Lucas saw a familiar face sitting on a bench. It was about a block or two away from the flat, and out of the way of anything else, so it didn’t really make much sense to Lucas. But there was Manon and her beautiful auburn hair whipping in the wind.

She saw him as he got closer and offered him a small smile, but it was clear she wasn’t happy. She looked nervous, actually. Lucas didn’t want to just walk past her and leave her there. He was curious to know what she was doing, and it seemed like she could use some company.

“Hey, Manon, what’s going on?” he asked as he approached her. A car horn blew loudly in the street behind him and he jumped.

“Oh, hi Lucas,” she said weakly. “Nothing’s going on, I’m just…” she trailed off. After a moment, it was clear she wasn’t going to finish her sentence.

“Do you mind if I sit?”

Manon looked like she wanted to protest, but she didn’t have an excuse. Lucas might have been a mess that day, but he was perceptive enough to know Manon didn’t want to tell him what she was doing there. He also knew it looked like she could use someone to talk to.

He sat down next to her without waiting for a response, but she didn’t argue. Instead she just sighed.

“How are you, Lucas?”

“I’m alright. How are you?” They were both looking at the cars passing on the street; it was strange to be in a conversation without facing each other. So different than how he had sat across from Eliott that morning, forced to look at him head-on. He and Manon weren’t looking at each other at all.

“Good. I’m good.”

“That’s good.”

Manon was looking for something, Lucas noted. She kept peering down the street, both ways, as if she was waiting for someone. It was a weird place to be meeting someone, if she was. It was out of the way of everything. Lucas wondered if he had inadvertently stumbled upon a clandestine meeting.

“Lucas? If you’re going to sit here with me, could you do me a favor?” Manon nervously drummed her fingers on the bench. Her nails were long, and they made a tapping sound that echoed on the hard bench.

“Uh, sure?”

“Distract me.”

“What?”

“You heard me,” she said, her voice containing a slight rise that could be construed as either playfulness or frustration. “Could you just talk about something? Anything?

“Okay,” he said, and thought for a moment. “Hey, can I ask you something?”

She seemed grateful for the distraction. “Yeah, what’s up?”

“I think I might’ve met someone.”

“What?” In an instant, Manon had whipped so she was fully facing him, turned sideways on the bench. Lucas continued to face the street, afraid of what he might say if he were looking directly into Manon’s eyes, because he really never had been a good liar and it was best if he distracted himself. So counted a dozen cars go past before he spoke again. 

“Yeah. On the bus today.”

“You met someone on the bus today?” There was a note of disappointment in Manon’s voice.

“Yeah,” he said. “ Or, no.” No, he hadn’t  _ just met  _ someone. There was much more to it than that. The way she said it made it clear his words were not accurately representing the cosmic moment he and Eliott had shared on the bus earlier.

“Well? Yes or no?”

“I knew this person before today. I just didn’t talk to...them.” He outwardly cringed at his stumbling over pronouns. It wasn’t subtle, but he wasn’t in the mood to completely give himself away.

Manon was gracious enough not to comment on word choice. “Is that supposed to make any sense to me?”

“No, I guess not. I don’t know, forget about it.”

“What? No! Didn’t you say you wanted to ask something?” He was watching her from the corner of his eye as she spoke, and he saw she was wearing a mischievous smile that exasperated him. Was she finding this  _ funny _ ? He gritted his teeth as a gust of wind blew past them. He hadn’t meant to dig himself into a conversation like this one. He had just wanted to give Manon a distraction. Now he was flustered and had some (unsteady) explaining to do.

“Uh, yeah. I did.” He paused and cleared his throat as he pondered how to word this. “How do you know if someone… likes you?” As soon as he said it, Lucas blushed. He hadn’t meant for that to sound so childish. But Manon, proving her worth -because any other friend surely would’ve teased him relentlessly about such a question- took a moment to think.

“How do you know if someone likes you? Hm, I don’t know,” she said. “I suppose there are lots of different ways.”

“Well, how did you know with-” Lucas abruptly cut himself off.

“With Charles?”

“Yeah. Sorry. I don’t mean to bring him up.”

“No, it’s okay.” She blew out of her mouth like she was trying to blow something away- a stray piece of hair maybe, or a stray thought. “I guess I never thought about it?”

That was funny to Lucas- that there were people out there who had things going on in their lives that they didn’t always have to think about. That Manon had been in a relationship and not endlessly tried to figure out its inner workings, had not questioned the reliability of her boyfriend and instead blindly trusted he loved her without desperately needing to know  _ why _ . It was something Lucas simply could not imagine.

“Well, how did you guys get together?” Lucas’s bubbling curiosity overwhelmed his guilt at dredging up past memories. “How did you know?”

“Ah, well,” Manon began, in the flippant way she spoke when she wanted to distance herself from her words. (Lucas couldn’t blame her for that, he knew it was much more painless that way.) “He pursued me, until I decided to pursue him back.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” she said. “That was all.”

“You make it sound easy.”

“It wasn’t.”

Lucas didn’t have a response for that, so he just waited a moment, and then Manon responded to herself:

“I shouldn’t say that. That makes it sound like it was always hard. It wasn’t; it was good! That’s why I went back to many times!” Suddenly she was exasperated and threw her hands in the air.  “So many times, Lucas. And now I’m sitting here on this bench.”

“What does the bench have to do with it?”

She just looked straight at him and cast her head back out towards the street. Tears were brimming behind her eyes. Dutifully, she scanned the area again.

“ _ Oh _ ,” he said. “Are you waiting for him right now?”

“Yes,” Manon said. She ducked her head down to check her phone, covering her face with her hair she did. She sniffled a bit. “And he’s going to be here any minute.”

Lucas couldn’t understand why she was meeting him, because she so clearly didn’t want to. But what he  _ could  _ understand was that whatever this was, his own presence was not needed.

“Okay. Okay, I’m going to go home now. Do you think you’ll be there soon?” he asked. She peered at him through the curtain of hair still separating them and let out a shaky breath.

“I don’t know.” Her voice was uneven and unsure. Lucas wanted to shed tears with her.

He reached over and out his arms around her. It was an awkward, one-armed hug, but Manon leaned into it.

“Listen,” he whispered against her ear, so quiet over the traffic he wasn’t quite sure she could hear him. “I’m not so good at this comforting thing, but I know when someone needs a hug. And whatever’s going on with you and Charles,  _ you _ , Manon, are going to be just fine.”

She sniffled a moment more before pulling away as quickly as she had drawn herself in. As Lucas stood to go, she pulled a compact mirror out of her purse. She opened it and furiously wiped at her eyes as Lucas began to walk away.

“Bye, Manon. I’ll see you later,” he called out, looking over his shoulder. Manon gave him a small and sad smile. He tried not to think about how he had been getting quite a few of those these days.

When he was farther away, he turned back, where Manon was still waiting. But she was standing now, and he could just barely make out the shine of freshly-applied red lipstick. She didn’t look like a person who had just been crying; she didn’t look like a person who had ever been sad at all. She looked quite like a dainty china doll, precious yet fragile, strong and perfect. He couldn’t help but note the way she had wiped away her streaked mascara and swiped on a new coat of lipstick. It had been done quickly and skillfully as if it was some sort mask she was used to putting on.

She was looking at something in front of her and waving. Lucas turned away. Private moments between Manon and Charles, no matter how much they itched at his curiosity, were not his to bear witness to.

So he pushed aside Manon’s sad smile and thought of another smile, one that had been imprinted on his brain, seared into every image he saw, distracting him at every available moment. Lucas couldn’t be sure if he was overreacting to all that happened on the bus that day. After all, not much had actually happened.

But something about it felt different to Lucas, something he couldn’t quite put his finger on just yet. And until he could figure that out, whatever it was, he was content with letting himself get carried away.

 

* * *

**Mardi 6:46**

Lucas stepped onto the bus with the same one-track mind he had been occupying the last twenty-four hours. He dared not to look until he was completely on, fare paid, doors closed behind him, fate sealed.

Looking for Eliott’s face in the crowd that day was an intense kind of scary, a lot like the first breath after nearly-drowning; a lot of people would think the scariest breath was the last one you thought you’d ever take, lungs filling with air as the light begins to fade. That wasn’t true. The scariest breath was the first one, back above water, when you still weren’t sure if your lungs would ever breathe again but you had to hope and trust they would. The hope and trust was what made it so scary.

Lucas held his breath, but not for long; it didn’t take long at all for him to find what he was looking for.

“Hello!” Eliott said, a fresh smile on his face, and Lucas breathed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed this chapter! I know I did. I really wanted to include a Manon subplot and a good Manon/Lucas friendship. I know people have their opinions on Manon (especially during the current season, yikes) but I love her. Anyway, if you enjoyed please leave a kudos or comment and don't be afraid to reach out to me on Tumblr @symphony4thedevil. Thanks for reading!


	5. All I Know is a New Found Grace

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “This is your stop.”  
> Lucas blinked and closed his mouth. Your stop. The words took a few seconds to register. Lucas frowned.  
> “Oh, right, well, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said hurriedly, grabbing his bag and standing up. “Uh, bye.”  
> He started to move away, but Eliott’s voice after him stopped him in his tracks.  
> “Lucas?”  
> “Yes?”  
> “I really hate saying goodbye to you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Here's the next chapter. It's a longer one. Title comes from "Everything Has Changed" by Taylor Swift and Ed Sheeran. I love that song and it is perfect for this chapter.

**Mardi 6:50**

It was amazing how the awkwardness and the stumbling over words and the difficulties of keeping conversation melted away so quickly under the warmth of Eliott’s smile. 

It was amazing how it was just yesterday that they met, and already Lucas felt so close to him. Amazing how easily their conversation flowed. Amazing how the rest of the world just drifted away. Amazing how Lucas hadn’t even thought twice about sitting down right beside Eliott instead of across from him, pushing them together in what little space there already was. 

Amazing how now, as they sat pressed close together, Lucas inhaled and everything was Eliott. There was suddenly nothing without him; he was everywhere. It was as if God had said, “Let there be Eliott,” and Lucas’s fate was sealed.

“Why didn’t you eat any breakfast?” Eliott asked softly. They were close enough that only the two of them could hear the conversation. It was blissfully private and Lucas tried to center in on the nerves in every place they were touching -knees, shoulders, ankles- just so he could remember the feeling. 

“I just never have the time,” Lucas said. Or the money to buy cereal, and he didn’t want to steal Lisa’s anymore. 

“Okay, but it’s the most important meal of the day,” Eliott said. “Didn’t you know that?” 

“Yes, but-”

“Ah, no ‘but.’ It is, it’s science! And lucky for you, I have food.” Eliott bent over and pulled his book bag into his lap, reaching in for a moment or two before pulling out two chocolate bars. 

“This?” Lucas asked. “This is your solution? This is candy.”

“Okay, well, I never said it had to be a healthy breakfast,” Eliott said as he opened one chocolate bar and set it back down on his lap. Lucas watched as he opened the second one. He expected Eliott to pass one to him, but he didn’t. He spilt them both in two and gave Lucas two halves, one from each. 

“They’re the same thing,” Lucas pointed out. “Why did you split them like that?”

“It’s nice to share, don’t you think?” 

As Lucas chewed on one of his pieces, he couldn’t help but agree.  _ Yes, yes it is. _ And it really was delicious; eating now was much more fun than starving until lunch time. Especially when Eliott was involved, sitting so close to him Lucas could hear him chewing. If breakfast everyday was something like this, he wouldn’t mind it very much at all. 

* * *

**Mardi 1:09**

“No, dude, I swear!” Basile exclaimed, throwing the red rubber ball to Lucas, who then threw it to Yann. “She told me she liked these shoes!”

“No, no way Daphné would say that!” Arthur said. “Those are the ugliest shoes I’ve ever seen in my life. I’ve seen rats prettier than those shoes.” He caught the ball and launched back at Lucas, who fumbled and dropped it to the ground. The boys let out a collective groan. 

“What was that, thirty-four?” Yann asked. “Nowhere near our high score.” They had began a game of tossing around the ball everyday at lunch, a fun little byproduct of their boredom and the fact that Arthur always seemed to find them in the bottom of his backpack (something about his mother always thinking he needed stress balls).

“Next time, we’ll beat it.” Basile said. “I’m hungry now.” He slid his backpack off his shoulders and reached inside for his lunch, the rest of the boys following suit. Lucas tucked the ball in his jacket pocket and produced his lunch: a tiny salad he had made that morning. 

‘What were we talking about?” Yann asked. When Basile and Arthur weren’t looking, he silently offered Lucas a part of his sandwich, but Lucas shook his head. 

“Basile’s lies,” Lucas supplied.

“Oh, right! Tell us again how Daphne fawned over your shoes. I think I can see your nose growing, Pinocchio!” Arthur said eagerly.  

“But she did! She so totally wants me,” Basile said with food in his mouth. Tiny pieces of bread clung to his teeth, and for all his affection towards Basile, Lucas couldn’t quite see what Daphne might be attracted to.  “I can feel it, boys. I’m so close to getting her to be my girlfriend.” 

“Yeah, as soon as you trick her into thinking you’re in her league,” Yann joked. The boys laughed and Basile faked taking offense to his words. 

“You guys need to support me!” he said. “Are you my friends or what?”

“Okay, we do support you. But do you really think you have a shot with her? I mean, she seems kind of… uptight. And you’re so…” Lucas trailed off. The silence spoke for itself, making Yann and Arthur laugh. 

“You’re one to talk! You never like anyone, Lucas,” Basile replied. 

“That’s not true,” Lucas replied, feeling the walls come up around him even if they were transparent. Instantly he was guarded and defensive, and the curious way Yann was looking at him wasn’t helping. 

“No, he’s right, Lucas,” Yann said. “You haven’t liked anyone in quite a while. Is there a girl who’s caught your eye?”

“ _ ‘Caught my eye’?  _ Who says that? What is this, the sixties?” Lucas snapped.

“Boys, I spot someone evading a question!” Arthur clapped his hands together and folded his legs in a mock therapist pose. “Please, Lulu, tell us about the object of your affection!” 

“There is no ‘object of my affection.’ Must you guys make everything sound so cheesy and weird? It’s so gay,” Lucas said, shrinking into body as he stabbed at a lettuce leaf in his salad.

“Our little Lulu is getting so defensive! I wonder who it could be!”

“There’s no one,” Lucas murmured, but his reply was lost amidst the boys’ speculations.

“Is it Manon?” Arthur suggested, nudging his arm. “You have been spending a lot of time with her and the girls since she came back.”

“Yeah, or Emma maybe?” Yann asked. “It’s been a while since we were together, you know, if you like her-”

“Is it Daphne?” Basile cut Yann off frantically, eyebrows drawn. “It’s not Daphne, is it?”

“No! No, it’s no one you know!” Lucas burst out. He flushed at his own raised voice.

“Hah!” Basile whooped, swinging a finger in Lucas’s face. “So there is someone!”

Lucas bit down on his lip and looked straight back at Basile, a fierce glare on his face. The boys were watching, waiting to hear what he would say. 

“No,” Lucas said. “There’s nobody. I’ve just been too stressed out to even think about girls.”

“Oh,” Yann said, all three boys’ faces filling with a guilty sort of remorse. “Right. Your mom, yeah? Is she alright?”

“Yeah, she’s fine,” Lucas responded, focusing on his food. “Can we talk about something else?”

His friends nodded, Arthur and Basile stammering a bit until they got a conversation about football flowing. Yann joined in when his input was needed, but mostly he just looked at Lucas, who was keeping a steady gaze down at his salad -which was pretty lame, if truth be told. Lucas had made a sorry attempt at foraging through the leftovers in the flat kitchen for a meal. It certainly wasn’t as fulfilling as that candy bar had been that morning. But he had a feeling the best part about his unusual breakfast wasn’t what he ate, but whom he shared it with. 

* * *

**Mercredi 6:53**

**“** Don’t be obvious about it, but look at the man behind you,” Eliott whispered. Lucas let out a few loose giggles -they had been laughing, Lucas couldn’t even remember about what- before turning around, peering at the direction Eliott was looking in, right above his own head and a little to the right. It was almost jarring to be reminded about the rest of the world; he had forgotten about the rows of seats beyond their own tiny pew, right near the front but still secluded by whatever it was that kept them so close and everyone else out.

Lucas obeyed and slowly turned around, still half-laughing. He focused his eyes on the man Eliott was looking at and whipped back around; it was painfully obvious what Eliott was trying to point out once Lucas had seen it for himself. Now he just had to try not to laugh in the man’s face.

“Oh my God,” Lucas said. He looks like…” he trailed off. The laughter was getting to him so that he couldn’t even coordinate sentences.

“Donald Trump!” Eliott finished. They laughed harder, but quietly, attempting to stifle what was loud to remain inconspicuous to the Donald Trump look-alike less than five feet away. Not that it really mattered. To Lucas, five feet could have been five miles, or maybe light years- they were on their own planet, in their own galaxy, one where Lucas was always invariably wrapped up in Eliott’s gravitational pull, too busy orbiting around him like a lost-puppy-kind-of-moon, to pay any sort of attention to just another stranger on the bus that morning. 

If the day before had been all smiles and secret touches and sharing breakfast candy bars, today was all laughter. Lucas couldn’t keep his head on straight. Everything was suddenly the most hilarious thing he’d ever seen or heard. 

He was delirious. This was a drug. Eliott was smiling and asking him a question and he couldn’t hear it over his own laughter. 

“ _ What _ ?” He asked, a bit too loudly. It was like they were shouting over the music at a party, but the music was his own voice and the party was this tiny slice of fantasy Lucas got to call a bus ride. It wasn’t even really a bus anymore. It was more of an oasis. 

“I said, do you think he heard us?” Eliott asked, dropping his voice. His eyes shone like beacons, and Lucas was entranced. He knew it in these moments when he looked in Eliott’s eyes that something strange was unlocking itself deep inside him. Some unknown presence that made music sound nicer and made love stories sweeter and made food taste better and made laughter come easier.

“I don’t know,” Lucas said. “I don’t care. He must know.”

Eliott raised himself up slightly in the seat and peeked back at the man.

“No, nothing,” he reported. “He’s not paying attention.”

“Oh, good,” Lucas said.

They looked at each other for a moment and started laughing again.

This was supposed to be the best medicine, Lucas knew.  _ Laughter.  _ It might just have been true -because he looked at Eliott as he laughed and he could almost feel everything healing.

* * *

**Mercredi 10:29**

“Okay, so, write the taxonomic ranking in order,” Imane said, laying a pencil and paper in front of Lucas. “Then, name the key components that both animal and plant cells share. Then list all of the functioning systems in the human body.”

Recently she had begun to develop small quizzes to test his knowledge, because clearly his brain wasn’t working well enough with basic revision. His test scores spoke to that.

It was kind of embarrassing, really, because Imane wasn’t the kind of person so sugarcoat or make his situation a little less painful. She had no qualms about scolding him over incorrect answer and getting annoyed at him. It was even worse when people started filing into the common room, so his humiliation had witnesses.

Still, he knew not to complain.  _ She doesn’t have to be helping me. I could be in this alone. _

He grasped the pencil and began to write, pulling knowledge of biology and cells from the back corner of his brain, the corner where everything was dusty and unused. He scribbled what he knew on the paper and skipped over what he didn’t. After a few moments (of not-so-carefully deliberating, because he wasn’t really in the mood to care), he slid the paper back over to Imane.

She swept it up with her hand and clicked on a red pen. She checked it over. And then she checked it over again. After a moment, she glanced up at Lucas with a frown on her face. Then she checked it again.

“What?” he asked. “Did I do the wrong thing? I don’t know how I could mess it up any worse than that time you told me to write down the element symbols-”

“Lucas,” Imane interrupted, a small smile growing hesitantly on her face. “This is all right.”

“What?”

“You didn’t get anything wrong! I mean, it’s basic stuff really, just the tip of the iceberg… But there’s not one mistake. That’s the first time there’s not been one mistake.” 

She smiled to herself as she read over the paper again, admiring its flawlessness. Imane was proud of her teaching skills, and rightfully so.

Lucas wasn’t so much proud as he was astounded. He wasn’t even paying attention. His body had been here in the common room, sure, scribbling away at the lined paper Imane placed in front of him. But his mind had been elsewhere. Laughing, on a bus.

He wondered where Eliott was right now. Where did the bus take him everyday, when Lucas got off?

Imane was still in disbelief.

“Lucas, have you been studying at home? I mean, this isn’t even what we’ve been reviewing!”

“Could you try not to sound so amazed?” He asked, gritting his teeth. “It’s good, yeah, but this is the stuff I should’ve known months ago, anyway. Can we just move on?”

“Right, right,” Imane said, jumping back into the textbook. “Sorry.”

She didn’t have to apologize. It wasn’t her job to make sure Lucas’s ego was left unbruised; after all, she had every right to be amazed that he got something right. She had been the one witnessing his stupidity for weeks now.

“Anyway, we’re not out of the woods yet,” she said. “Let’s not get over-excited at small victories. I won’t rest until you’re solving ground-breaking chemical formulas.”

Lucas was glad to move the conversation away from the quiz he had passed; he knew it was just a fluke, and that as they moved into more difficult subjects, his understandings would falter. Still, it  _ was  _ progress, which was what Lucas so desperately needed. The clock was counting down until  _ le bac _ , and he knew he wasn’t ready at all. But if the sessions with Imane were paying off, even in tiny ways, well, that was reason for relief.

* * *

**Jeudi 6:55**

“So, my last year of school, I almost failed out,” Eliott said. His feet were kicked up on the seat in front of him so that he was sort of laying down -a position that unsurprisingly put a lot of Eliott’s weight on Lucas, sitting next to him. Not that Lucas minded even the slightest bit.

“Really? What happened?” Lucas asked.

“I just wasn’t in a very good place, I don’t know. I started blowing off school a lot. But my friends eventually they got me to start coming back and they all came together to help me study so I could actually pass  _ le bac _ .”

“That’s good,” Lucas said. “They sound like really good friends.”

“They are. If not for them, I would be in the same grade as you right now. I might even have transferred to your school,” Eliott said.

“That’s strange to even think about.”

“Yeah,” Eliott said. He shifted around in his seat so he leaned against the window and not Lucas -Lucas was sad to lose his touch but glad when Eliott’s eyes fixated on him. Eliott had a way of looking at him so intensely he felt naked, like Eliott was looking at his soul. It was a thrilling and terrifying feeling.

“Tell me about your friends,” Eliott said.

Lucas thought for a moment. On one hand, there were so many people he could name -the boys, the girls, the flatmates. Those were all his friends, or at least people he was friendly to. But on the other hand, Lucas was feeling so distanced from all of them recently, and not just because he spent so much time thinking of Eliott. There was an aching divide now between him and everyone else he knew.  _ Friends  _ was a more difficult thing to ask him to name than it should’ve been. He decided just to stick to the basics.

“Well, there’s Yann, my best friend. He’s been there for me since I was a kid. And then there’s Basile and Arthur, and the four of us kind of make up our group.”

“Your group?”

“Yeah, I mean, we hang out a lot together. We always do stuff with each other. Just last week we went to a nice restaurant for Arthur’s birthday. That’s actually why I didn’t have breakfast the other day. I spent my money on Arthur’s food so he wouldn’t have to pay on his birthday.” He blushed. He didn’t know why he said that.

“That was nice of you,” Eliott said. “You’re nice.”

Lucas blushed deeper. “Not really. We all did it. I'm not that nice.”

“Hm, I think you are. And it’s so important to have nice friends.” His voice got quieter as his shoulders slumped.

“Yes,” Lucas agreed, not failing to notice the sudden change in Eliott’s usual exuberance. “Are you still in touch with yours?”

“Ah.” Eliott smiles sheepishly. “They all went away to school. I’m the only one still in the city.”

“Oh,” Lucas said. His friends were pains in the ass, but he couldn’t imagine a life where they had gone completely, leaving him alone in the city that they had once shared together. It seemed like such a lonely existence. Lucas was glad his friends had all decided to stay close by each other the next year in university; none of them wanted to leave home, anyway. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Eliott said, and he was back to being happy in the blink of an eye. He smiled. “Let’s talk about something else.”

“Okay,” Lucas said. “Hey, what do you do in school?”

“I’m studying art, actually,” Eliott said, a passionate gleam in his eyes. “It’s always been the only thing for me, as long as I can remember.”

“Really? I can’t imagine what it’s like to know what you want to do,” Lucas confessed. “I still feel so lost. Nothing in school sticks out to me. The things that interest me are always the things that I can never understand.”

“It’s okay, Lucas. You have time.” Eliott’s voice was steady. Lucas put his trust in it.

“So you’re an artist?” Lucas asked, shifting up and sitting cross-legged on the bench so that he was facing Eliott. One bad brake and he’d go flying, but it was worth it to get to look in his face like this.

“Yes,” Eliott responded, staring into Lucas’s eyes. “Well, I like to consider myself more of a storyteller than anything.”

“Really?”

“Yes."

"So can you tell me a story?”

Eliott got a mischievous glint in his eyes. “Okay. I will.” He cleared his throat and dropped his voice. “Once upon a time, there was a boy named Eliott.” Lucas giggled at the tone of his voice, and Eliott smiled. “And there was a boy named Lucas, who laughed at everything.”

“Eliott was riding the bus one day when he saw Lucas,” Eliott continued. “Lucas looked like a mess, and Eliott thought he seemed cool, so he smiled at him and stuck his tongue out and made a mental note to remember Lucas. So the next time Eliott got on the bus, he sat where Lucas usually was, and made sure to start a conversation with him.”

“This story sounds awfully familiar,” Lucas said. “Are you sure it’s not plagiarized?”

“Stop, Lucas, I’m just getting to the good part. So, they sat next to each other that day, and every day after that, and they talked about everything from Donald Trump to friendships, and Eliott even came to Lucas’s rescue with a beautiful five-course breakfast meal-”

“It was a candy bar!”

“-that Lucas still seems shockingly ungrateful for.” Eliott grinned at him and Lucas’s heart soared. When he continued, his voice was softer now, and more serious. “But Eliott, he didn’t mind. He would have shared that candy bar again and again with Lucas, because Lucas deserved it. He was really nice, and cute, and he was definitely the kind of person not only to share food with you, but give you all of it if you needed. And he was the kind of friend to spend the last of his money on you at your birthday meal even if it meant he couldn’t get food for himself. And he was a really great listener. And really great to talk to. And really cute.”

Eliott leaned in closely, so close that Lucas could smell him. He smelled like cologne and lemons. Lucas’s breath hitched. Their faces were so close now, closer than they had ever been. Lucas could count Eliott’s eyelashes if he wanted.

Lucas couldn’t breathe. Slowly, he inched his face closer to Eliott’s. Eliott let out a shaky breath. Their foreheads were nearly touching now, Lucas’s mouth slightly agape.

And just like he had leaned in, Eliott pulled back again.

“This is your stop.”

Lucas blinked and closed his mouth.  _ Your stop _ . The words took a few seconds to register. Lucas frowned.

“Oh, right, well, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said hurriedly, grabbing his bag and standing up. “Uh, bye.”

He started to move away, but Eliott’s voice after him stopped him in his tracks.

“Lucas?”

“Yes?”

“I really hate saying goodbye to you.”

* * *

**Jeudi 7:14**

Manon got home that evening and came directly into the living room. She sat on the couch besides Lucas and was silent for a moment before she spoke. Lucas, who was watching the T.V., turned the volume down when she began.

“I was thinking about what you asked me the other day,” she said, sighing. “And I was thinking about what I told you about how I just decided to pursue Charles back.”

“Okay,” he said hesitantly, because he really wasn’t following. Manon wrung out her hands and took a deep breath.

“And I realized that no matter how desperately you want to know if a person likes you, what’s much more important is the way they make you feel.”

Lucas nodded.

“Because it’s so important to know you’re surrounding yourself with the right people,” she said, voice quivering. Lucas thought he saw the shine of tears in her eyes. “It’s so important because no matter how much a person can tell you they love you, they might not make you feel like they do, when it really matters.”

“Manon,” Lucas said, reaching out to hold her hand. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” she said, shaking her head as if to rid herself of the conversation. “I’m fine, really. I just got back from dinner with Charles and I ended things with him for good.”

“Okay. Do you want to talk about it?”

“No,” she said, cracking a half-smile. “I want to talk about anything but that.”

“Okay, then we can talk about how I nearly aced that literature test today,” he said, gesturing towards the books out on the table with a cheeky smile.

“Nice! Good, Lucas, I’m really glad.” They were still holding hands. Manon squeezed his tightly. “How do you think you’re doing in science? Is studying with Imane helping?”

Lucas liked how she said  _ studying _ and not  _ tutoring _ , because it made him feel a lot less stupid.

“Yeah, it’s going good. I think I might actually be improving.”

“That’s great! I’m sure you are.” She seemed genuinely happy for him. “And how about that video series you like? Polaris, was it?”

He nodded, surprised she remembered the name. Actually, it had been a while since Polaris crossed his mind. He pulled out his phone and went straight to the Instagram page. He let out a small gasp.

“There’s actually been an update,” he informed her when she leaned closer to look at his phone.  He studied the pictures. They looked pretty much the same as the others, except now he saw that one of them said “polar.” The others just contained cut-off letters.

“I don’t understand,” Manon said. “What is it?”

“Some sort of code,” he replied, shutting off his phone. “I’m not sure yet.” He hoped that the clues would begin to make more sense, and that they might even give some answers. He still wasn’t sure what it was he was even looking for, and neither was the rest of the people awaiting an update. Could the posts be spelling out a title? A name? So much was still unclear. But if he thought about it too long, he would get a headache, so he pushed his phone away and pushed Polaris out of his mind.

“You’ll figure it out,” she said, just as Mika rushed in the room. He crashed onto the couch between them in a great ball of energy and wrapped Manon and Lucas up in each of his arms. ‘

“I missed you guys! Have you come to watch Drag Race with me?” He grabbed up the remote and started clicking through the channels. “I know it’s Lucas’s guilt pleasure but I thought Manon looked down upon reality T.V.!”

“It’s not my guilty pleasure,” Lucas protested. “I just always have to watch it with you because the room with the T.V. is also my bedroom.”

“And I don’t mind reality T.V.,” Manon said. “But I can’t watch tonight. I’m feeling a bit tired. I think I’m just going to go to sleep.”

“Whatever, losers,” Mika said. He sat up in a flash. “Fuck! Forgot popcorn!” He jumped up and ran back into the kitchen, followed by the sound of microwave popcorn. Lucas watched him go with a small grin.

“Manon?” he asked as she got up to leave. It’s true that she looked tired, but Lucas was thinking of the wounded look in her eyes before, when she told him about Charles. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m good, really,” she said. “I just needed to tell you all that because I was so confused. It was better to say it out loud… “ Manon sighed. “I think I let myself get caught up in all the love for so long that I forgot I wasn’t really feeling loved, no matter how much he said it. Don’t ever let yourself feel like that, okay Lucas? Promise me.”

“Okay. I promise.”

* * *

**Vendredi 6:47**

Eliott looked more beautiful with every passing day.

Lucas didn’t really like that word.  _ Beautiful _ . He thought it was too often used as a backup, a word you could call someone who wasn’t necessarily  _ pretty  _ or  _ hot  _ or  _ cute. _

But Eliott, he realized, was all of these things and more. He was pretty  _ and _ hot  _ and _ cute. He was funny and charming and his soul shone from the inside out, pure sunlight bleeding through from every smile, every gesture. Lucas didn’t have any words that fit Eliott besides  _ beautiful _ . Luckily, it suited him.

And while he never looked so different, each morning they met gave Lucas a new fact about Eliott. He learned through his movements and through his words, Lucas hanging on to Eliott’s every motion and syllable as if they carried the secrets of the universe. For all he knew, they did.

On the first day, he learned Eliott was caring and thoughtful and had eyes that were a better blue than the seas and skies combined.

On the second day, he learned Eliott took care of people, even if it meant sharing his breakfast, and that he thought candy was a more suitable breakfast than nothing at all.

On the third day, he learned Eliott liked to laugh, and that he had a laugh more majestic than any classical piece Lucas could play on the piano. Truly, it was a shame so many people had wasted their lives creating beautiful songs, composing breathtaking symphonies, because nothing in the world could ever sound as perfect and magical as Eliott’s laugh.

On the fourth day, he learned Eliott could tell stories that took his breath away a thousand times over, and that even his words outside the realms of storytelling could catch Lucas off his guard.  _ I really hate saying goodbye to you. _

Today was the fifth day, and Lucas stepped onto the bus uncertainly. Everyday he sat with Eliott was another day he had counted on being alone. He kept expecting Eliott to stop him mid-conversation, bored of Lucas and too desperate to escape him to even be polite. It’s not that Eliott seemed rude or even untrustworthy. It’s just that Lucas still couldn’t quite wrap his head around whatever it was they were doing.

But Eliott was sitting where he always was, with a grin and a bag of chips that he held out for Lucas to share. Eliott had started bringing along these little snacks for them to eat, a breakfast of sorts, feeding Lucas when he so clearly refused to feed himself.

Lucas would have felt a little guilty for eating Eliott’s food if he didn’t know that the only reason Eliott even brought food was Lucas.

“I realized something yesterday after I left,” Lucas said, putting another chip in his mouth. “What do you do when I get off this bus? I mean, I know you’re in university, but I don’t imagine your classes start at the same time every day. Where do you go? Do you work?”

Eliott looker at him carefully. Then he raised his eyebrows and focused his attention on something out of the window.

“No, I don’t work. I’m just a student.”

“Ah,” Lucas laughed. “Any hobbies, then?”

“No,” Eliott said. “Well, yes, one, if art counts.”

“Art counts. But I still don’t get it. Where do you go?”

“Ah, I don’t know,” he said, eyes still fixed on something. “If I have a class, I just go and hang around a little while before. If I don’t have class for a while… sometimes I just ride the bus back around to my apartment.”

Lucas furrowed his brows. “What?”

“Yeah, I don’t know,” Eliott said sheepishly. He ran his hand through his hair -Lucas watching intently, of course- and reached for another chip.

“I don’t get it. You ride the bus for no reason?”

“Well…” said Eliott, shifting his eyes back over to Lucas, whose mouth was suddenly dry. “Not for no reason.”

Lucas blushed and didn’t say anything.

“Lucas?”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t want to go another weekend without seeing you.”

“Okay.” Lucas was watching his hands crinkle the bag of chips as Eliott spoke.

“I have something with my parents on Sunday. Are you doing anything tomorrow?”

Lucas really,  _ really _ wanted to say no. But he had promised Daphne weeks ago to take care of that stupid fucking mural.

“I am, actually.” He sighed. “Not that I want to be. I told my friend I’d paint some wall in the common room for her.”

“I didn’t think you were a painter,” Eliott said. Lucas avoided his gaze, not wanting to see if he looked hurt. He wasn’t trying to get out seeing Eliott; it was all he wanted to do, all the time

“I’m not. It’s a long story.”

“Okay. You can tell it to me tomorrow.” Eliott playfully kicked his foot out at Lucas -today they were sitting across from each other.

“I just told you I’m busy tomorrow.”

“I’ll be busy with you. Can I help you paint it?”

“You would do that?” Lucas looked up.

“Of course,” Eliott said, gesturing towards the bag of chips. “I already feed you. You think I wouldn’t help you out?”

“Okay. Okay, great. Uh, should we meet somewhere?”

“I mean, we can just take the bus at the same time.”

“Oh, right.” Lucas blushed again; he was blushing a lot today. “Okay, cool.”

“Cool.”

When they reached Lucas’s stop, Lucas got up to leave, nearly tripping over his own feet on his way into the aisle.

“Lucas?” Eliott said from behind him, laughing.

“Yeah?”

“There’s two.”

“What?” Lucas asked as people brushed past him on their way out. They were annoyed he was waiting, but as long as Eliott was talking to him, his feet were glued in place.

“Two. I have two hobbies. The first is art. And the second is thinking about you. All the time, until I see you again. There’s two.”

* * *

**Vendredi 8:03**

As soon as Lucas had gotten home from school he fell asleep on the couch. When he woke up, the first thing he noticed was that the sun had set, and he briefly thought it was the middle of the night.

The second thing he noticed was when he picked up his phone to check the time and saw the twenty missed messages.

He sat up and rubbed at his eyes, heart pounding. He scanned the text messages, desperate for the delirium of sleep to wear off so he could comprehend what the texts said. He caught glimpses of words - _ Maman. Episode. Call.-  _ but nothing was clicking.

It was his father who had sent the texts, but it was the number of the health facility that called and left messages, so he chose to respond there first. He pressed on the number and held the phone up to his ear, the only noise being the phone’s signal and his own shaky breathing.

“Hello?” said the voice on the other end. It was a man’s voice. Lucas had stupidly hoped it would be the woman from his visit, Michelle. “Who is this?”

“Lucas Lallemant,” he said in a croaky voice. “You guys called me.”

“Ah, yes, Lallemant,” said the man. “Hold on one second.”

Lucas heard muffled voices and the sound of the phone being passed around. He sighed and tried to hold back tears of frustration.

“Hello?” asked another voice, this time a woman, familiar. “Lucas?”

“Michelle? Michelle, is my mom alright?”

“Oh, darling,” she cooed. “I’m sorry if we worried you. Your mom had a bit of an episode tonight. It looks like her medication isn’t working so well anymore.” Michelle  pulled away from the phone to speak to someone with her. Lucas tried to steady his breathing as he waited for her to continue.

“But don’t worry, okay? She’s going to be fine. It was nothing serious.”

“Can I come see her?”

“I’m sorry, Lucas, but I don’t think that’s a very good idea. But I promise to call you with updates as soon I think she’s stable for visitors.”

He nodded, then remembered she couldn’t see him and let out a weak “Okay.” Suddenly there were more voices on the other end, and some sort of commotion.

“I have to go, dear. I’m sorry. Things are crazy over here. Please try not to worry too much. It’s going to be alright. Just take it day by day, remember?”

_ Day by day. Day by day. _

“Okay. Thank you.”

“Okay dear. I’ll talk to you soon.”

There was a click on the other end, and Michelle’s soothing tone was gone, replaced by the quiet sounds of the dark room he sat in alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There it is! I hope it wasn't too dialogue-heavy, that was a worry of mine. And I didn't get to edit this chapter as much as I'd have liked because I'm about to go on vacation with my family and I won't be able to post until sometime after I get back on the 2nd. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed! Please leave a kudos or comment and don't be afraid to reach out to me on Tumblr @symphony4thedevil if you want :)


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